Hyderabad: The Yazdani brothers now in the custody of National Investigative Agency (NIA) for their Islamic State links were acting on the directions given by Muhammad Shafi Armar, the head of Indian jihadists at the terror groups headquarters in Raqqa in Syria, according to official sources.

The two brothers, arrested along with nine others from old city of Hyderabad on Wednesday, are engineering graduates. The elder one, Mohammed Ibrahim Yazdani did his software engineering degree at Anwar Ul Uloom college in Vikarabad in Ranga Reddy district. He is the kingpin of this entire module. The younger one, Ilyas Yazdani, is a computer engineering graduate.

The others are youth, most of them under 32. Nine members of the group are graduates, four of them in computer science. The module was operating on the directions of its Syria-based handler Shafi Armar who was reported to be killed sometime back. However, Armar, a native of Batkal in Karnataka, is believed to be alive and is doing his operations remotely from an undisclosed place.

The police confirm that the 11 youth knew each other very well and did practice sessions at Barkas. They had planned Brussels type destructions that include suicide bombing and massive gun fire to kill maximum number of people.

The killings were planned at huge public gatherings during various festivals coming in a week or two, sources said. The incidents were planned in and around IT corridor of Gachibowli, Hitech City and also in Bangalore simultaneously, sources revealed.

They formed into three teams to execute their plans. By creating destruction in the IT corridor, where global giants like Google, Microsoft, Oracle, Amazon and others, they wanted to grab the worldwide attention.

The operatives acquired explosive material, guns and other ammunition, which were recovered from them by the NIA teams. They had received huge amounts of money through hawala. Rs15.00 cash was recovered from them at the time of arrest. They were planning to buy more arms and ammunition.

Meanwhile, the NIA booked FIR on the five of the arrested and they are to be presented before the court on Thursday. The arrest of the six of the total 11 suspects taken into custody on Wednesday was not shown in records as they were not found to be connected with the group.

After taking custody through court orders, the NIA will shift the five accused to Delhi to question further and find their links in other parts of the country.