The agency said in a statement that it had conducted the searches at the houses of three suspects — two in Kasaragod and one in Palakkad.

New Delhi: The National Investigation Agency on Sunday carried out searches at three places in Kerala as part of its investigation into the ISIS Kasaragod module case.

The agency said in a statement that it had conducted the searches at the houses of three suspects — two in Kasaragod and one in Palakkad. “These persons are suspected to have links with some of the accused in the case who had exited India to join the proscribed terrorist organisation ISIS/Daesh,” the NIA said. The searches assume significance given the recent attacks in neighbouring Sri Lanka and the devastating bomb blasts there last Sunday.

The NIA said that mobile phones, SIM cards, memory cards, pen drives, diaries with handwritten notes in Arabic and Malayalam, DVDs and books of certain controversial Islamic preacher Zakir Naik, besides some untitled DVDs and CDs with religious speeches, and books of Syed Kutheb were recovered during the searches. “The digital devices will be forensically examined and analysed,” the agency said, adding that the three suspects are being questioned. The NIA had recently arrested an ISIS sympathiser from Delhi. The ISIS sympathiser, identified as Mohammad Faiz, was arrested for allegedly conspiring to carry out blasts in Delhi and Uttar Pradesh. Faiz was a key member of Harkat-ul-Harb-e-Islam, which is a pro-Islamic State module. According to the NIA, he was allegedly involved in founding the group and bringing other members into its fold. “The case pertains to the Harkat-ul-Harb-e-Islam group of terrorists who formed a gang which was engaged in acts preparatory to commission of terror attacks with a view to wage war against the Government of India,” the NIA had said. In September last year, the NIA had arrested Nashidul Hamzafar, an accused in the ISIS Kasargod case, after he was deported from Kabul to New Delhi. Hamzafar belongs to Kerala’s Kalpetta. He was arrested in Afghanistan for illegally entering the country to join his associates in ISIS. Hamzafar’s arrest was related to the conspiracy hatched by some ISIS sympathisers from Kasaragod district of Kerala and their associates in 2015 to propagate the ideology of the Islamic State.