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Bengaluru police has launched an investigation after a report by channel4.com tracked down a pro-ISIS Twitter handle being operated out of the city, say media reports.
The Twitter handle, @ShamiWitness, had almost 130,000 tweets which were seen more than two million times each month. This, perhaps, is the highest by any pro-ISIS Twitter account. It had around 178,000 followers. However, the handle has been taken down by the account owner following the Channel4 report.
“Two thirds of all foreign fighters on Twitter followed him. When a fighter's Twitter account is suspended, he often promoted the new one and urged people to follow it. He spoke to British jihadis regularly, before they leave to join the Islamic State, after they arrived, and if they died he praised them as martyrs,” says the Channel4.com news report.
Though the news website, run by British-based Channel 4, has refused to reveal the full name of the man, they say he is called Mehdi and is an executive working for an Indian conglomerate in Bengaluru.
According to the Channel4 report, Mehdi said he would have gone to join Islamic State himself had his family not been financially dependent on him: "If I had a chance to leave everything and join them I might have.. my family needs me here."
However, his Facebook accounts are a contrast to his Twitter handle. He regularly shares jokes, funny images and talks about superhero movies, posting pictures of pizza dinners with friends, and Hawaiian parties at work on his Facebook page.
Elsewhere on Facebook there are indications of his Islamist ideology, in conversations about Libya and Egyptian uprisings.
