Nine Indians held at Turkey-Syria border, deported

Bengaluru, Jan 31 : Nine Indians from three southern states were detained at the Turkey-Syria border and deported to India where they were being questioned on their motives, police said Saturday. "Turkish authorities detained the nine-member Indian group at the border while attempting to cross over to Syria and deported them to India late Friday," city Police Commissioner M.N. Reddi said in a statement here. Of those deported were Muhammed Abdul Ahad, 46, and his wife and five children from Chennai, Javed Baba, 24, from Khammam district in Telangana and Ibrahim Nowfal, 24, from Hassan in Karnataka, about 180 km from here. "The group, which landed in Istanbul on tourist visas from Bengaluru Dec 24, were sent back to India by the Turkish authorities," Reddi said. Ahad, who has a masters in computer science from Kennedy-Western University in California, worked in the US for over a decade, while Javeed and Nowfal are engineers. "On landing at the city airport, our policemen and officials of central agencies interrogated them on the circumstances under which they went to Turkey. Investigation is underway to check their background and motive behind travelling to Syria via Turkey," Reddi added.