Lucknow, Oct 1 (PTI) The Uttar Pradesh Anti-Terrorist Squad (ATS) on Friday said it arrested one more person in connection with the alleged illegal conversion racket.
Dheeraj Jagtap, a resident of Yavatmal in Maharashtra, was taken into custody by an ATS team in Kanpur. After finding him suspicious, he was brought to Lucknow where he was arrested, Additional Director General of Police (Law and Order) Prashant Kumar said in a statement issued by the ATS.
He said Jagtap will be produced before a court on Saturday.
The ATS had arrested some people for allegedly running an illegal 'conversion racket' on June 20.
During the course of the investigation in this case, 14 more people, including Maulana Umar Gautam, Maulana Kalim Siddiqui, Rameshwar Kawade alias Adam, Bhupriya Bando alias Arsalan Mustafa and Kausar Alam have been arrested, according to officials.
Investigation revealed that Jagtap has been involved in Dawah' (the act of inviting or calling people to embrace Islam) since his conversion to Islam about 10 years ago, along with Kawade and others, the release said.
For this purpose, Jagtap created several WhatsApp groups and used to 'lure' people to adopt Islam, it said.
He is also a member of Dawah group Islamic Youth Federation and is connected to a country-wide network related to conversion, the ATS alleged.
According to police, Jagtap has also got people to convert on the pretext of getting them jobs.
