Rajnath Singh informs House on ISIS Twitter operator

"He has denied having recruited any person for ISIS. Further investigation is in progress," said Singh.

Giving details Singh said: “Mehdi Masroor Biswas aged around 24 years was arrested on December 13,2014 by the Bangalore Police in case crime No.01218/2014 u/s 3,13 and 18 of the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act,1967, Section 66 F of the Information Technology Act and Section 125 of the Indian Penal Code.

"The accused had come to prominence in the electronic media in the U.K regarding his role in circulating ISIS material through a Twitter account. The central agencies worked in close collaboration with the Karnataka Police to develop information leading to his arrest. Mehdi had a Twitter account under the username “Shami Witness”. He used to visit prominent ISIS related sites, mostly in Arabic Language and then translate the contents in to English and repost the material on his twitter account," said Singh.

"During interrogation Mehdi disclosed that more than 60% of his twitter account followers were non-Muslims from western countries and a majority of his Muslim followers were from the western countries, particularly the U.K. Mehdi started closely following the developments in Syria, Iraq and Afghanistan through internet during his college days and has been active in the social networking sites since 2009 . Over a period of time Mehdi started interacting with people in the social networking sites on matters related to  Jihad," said the statement of Singh.

"Mehdi belongs to a middle class family from Kolkata and has done his electrical engineering from Gurunanak Dev Institute of Technology in 2012. He joined ITC following a campus recruitment drive and is currently employed there.

The Bengaluru Police was on Sunday granted five days custody of Mehdi Masroor Biswas.

Biswas was arrested on Saturday from his home in Bengaluru.

An alumnus of West Bengal Institute of Technology, Biswas was allegedly behind Twitter handle “@shamiwitness”.

He came to Bengaluru in 2011.

Sources said three different teams, including the cyber crime cell, had been formed on Friday and accordingly they launched a manhunt for him.

The security agencies had also sought records from Twitter, Facebook and Google to track Biswas down, reports said.

UK-based Channel 4 news on Thursday claimed that the man who operated the Twitter handle was one of the most influential recruiters for the Islamic State. It also said that the man was based in Bengaluru.

Meanwhile, the father of the youth in Kolkata, a retired assistant engineer of West Bengal State Electricity Board who now is a homeopath doctor, said his son is innocent and his account was hacked.

"His account was hacked. He is a studious boy all along," Mikail Biswas, father of Mehdi, said.