Indian scientist Mukesh Shukla wanted to turn the world's attention to his HIV research, so since desperate times call for desperate measures, he decided to do so by faking an ISIS threat letter.
Shukla, who is from Ahmedabad, Gujarat, claimed that the extremist terrorist group sent him a threatening letter in Arabic demanding information on a "secret drug formula for treating malaria and HIV."
He told the police that they (ISIS) threatened to kill him if he did not hand over the information to them. The police took immediate action by putting him on a 12-hour protection cycle.
After his protection order expired, Shukla told the police that he was attacked with some sort of chemical spray while walking home, according to the Hindustan Times.
He said his money and a pen drive with his AIDS research were taken as well.
But turns out, the entire story and the letter had been fabricated.
An Arabic language expert told the police that the letter was not written in proper Arabic.
A more thorough investigation by the Cyber Cell of Ahmedabad Detection of Crime Branch later found an English copy of the letter on Shukla's computer.
They also found a deleted Google translator app.
"We checked the computer system of Shukla and extracted all the data. We examined the data and found a letter written in English got translated exactly as the threat letter through the Google application," said Rajdeepsinh Jhala, assistant commissioner of DCB, according to RT.
Shukla has not been arrested or detained yet.
"We are mulling our next step considering that Shukla is a senior citizen and currently under medication," said Deepak Meghani, superintendant of the police.
Shukla has been working on treating malaria and HIV for 28 years, but after the world failed to take notice of his efforts, he descended into depression.
He claims that he has found the cure to HIV, malaria and other diseases.
