Saquib Nachan, the alleged head of ISIS’s India operations and a former senior leader of the banned Students Islamic Movement of India (SIMI), died on Saturday afternoon at Delhi’s Safdarjung Hospital following a brain haemorrhage. He was 57. Nachan had been lodged in Tihar Jail since 2023 after being arrested by the National Investigation Agency (NIA) for his alleged role in an ISIS-linked terror module operating in Delhi and Maharashtra’s Padgha region.
He was admitted to the hospital on June 24 after his health deteriorated while in custody. Doctors diagnosed him with a brain haemorrhage shortly after admission. Despite four days of treatment, his condition worsened, and he was declared dead at 12:10 pm.
A resident of Padgha in Maharashtra’s Thane district, Nachan was a prominent SIMI functionary during the late 1990s and early 2000s. He came under national scrutiny during the investigation into a series of bomb blasts in Mumbai between 2002 and 2003, including attacks at Mumbai Central, Vile Parle, and Mulund, which killed at least 13 people and injured over 100. He was convicted under the Prevention of Terrorism Act (POTA) for possessing illegal arms, including an AK-56 rifle, and served a 10-year prison sentence, which ended in 2017 after remission for good behaviour.
In 2023, Nachan was rearrested by the NIA in a coordinated crackdown on ISIS-affiliated modules. He was accused of administering oaths of allegiance to new recruits and identified as the key conspirator in the Delhi-Padgha ISIS module case. His death brings a close to a long and controversial chapter in India’s efforts to counter radical Islamist networks. Authorities said his body will be handed over to his family following a post-mortem, with funeral rites expected to be held in Padgha.