Devendra Fadnavis calls PFI a ‘silent killer’, says will work towards shutting down outfit in Maharashtra

Maharashtra Home Minister claims PFI responsible for triggering Amravati riots of November last year

Dubbing the Popular Front of India (PFI) “a silent killer”, Maharashtra Home Minister and Deputy Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis, while lauding the Centre’s ban on the outfit, said on Wednesday that the State Government would take steps to completely shut down the PFI and six affiliate organisations in Maharashtra in the coming months.

“There were inputs regarding the PFI’s activities that were continuously being received by Central and State agencies. They [the PFI] was silently trying to engineer divisiveness in society and attempting to destroy the country’s social fabric PFI was trying to sow the seeds of violence by creating false narratives. We will be conducting investigations in such a way that the outfits and their affiliates completely cease any activity in Maharashtra in the future,” said Mr. Fadnavis speaking in Mumbai.

Stating that all State Governments would soon be receiving formal notifications regarding the Centre’s five-year ban on the PFI and its affiliates, the BJP leader mooted the possibility of there being more affiliates of the PFI beside the six frontal organisations.

“There could be more outfits linked to the PFI which would now be unravelled as investigations progress into their activities,” Mr. Fadnavis said.

Alleging that the PFI used to mask their terror activities behind “a humanitarian face”, Mr. Fadnavis alleged that the outfit began carrying out anti-national activities in a surreptitious manner once they knew that big terror acts were not possible owing to the diligence of the armed forces and the intelligence services.

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Mr. Fadnavis said that to this end, the PFI had prepared “financial models” wherein numerous accounts were opened and small sums of money would be deposited in them in such a manner as to escape notice.