India's Most Wanted Killed in Pakistan: The truth behind the killings

A look at the world of politics, statecraft, diplomacy and books

Till now around 16 most wanted terrorists have been killed within Pakistan by unknown gunmen. The question that is being asked is a simple one: Is India behind the string of killings. This controversy has gained added salience due to the insinuation  of the US Deparment of Justice official that India, or some individual named Nikhil was behind an attempt on the life of the Kaliastani terrorist, Pannu. Let us take one issue first. India certainly has the intent to punish terrorists who roam the world scot free. But does India have the capability to launch kinetic strikes against terrorists. 

In the world today only 2 States have the capability of launching kinetic strikes against enemies, Israel and USA. MOSSAD is well known and the CIA has organized subversive strikes all over the world, the Nord Stream Pipeline being the most recent. India's  R&AW which was founded in 1968 has acquired information and itel gathering capacity. Its Electronic surveillance, particularly along the borders and the Coast is impressive and over the years has built its Humit network in certain countries, particularly Pakistan, Sri Lanka and Nepal. However, it does not have the capacity nor the capability to launch assassinations and targeted interventions in any part of the world. Perhaps Nepal is the only country in which the R&AW operates with a fair degree of latitude. R&AW has cooperated with Bangladesh in identifying and transporting Mujib's killers who had sought refuge in India and successive Governments chose to ignore their presence. Of late the organization has increased its footprint in the Myanmar border region and the purpose is only to protect India. The collapse of the Myanmar Army would be a serious blow to India's aggressive counter insurgency strategy. I do not want to reveal more.

Returning to Pakistan, the death of the known terrorists is hardly a cause of concern. But India is being blamed for the death. While India does have the intent, capability is another matter. Further, the Government of India security apparatus reports directly to the Prime Minister through Ajit Doval and given the complex situation in diplomatic arena and the rapid rise in India's international stature, it is very unlikely that the Government would resort to illegal kinetic measures. R &AW has collected a great deal of information about terrorists and their network and it will not share this with either USA or Canada. India is only a beginner in the game of Big Power politics and will not jeopardise its goals early in the game. So obviously India is not directly involved. Deniability is very important and it takes time to build layers of deniability.

From 1999 onwards, when Benazir Bhutto came to power, the Islamic Republic of Pakistan has been encouraging terrorism in Kashmir and has built up support among identity groups in Uttar Pradesh and Kerala and Tamil Nadu. I K Gujral in 1997 as the appointed unelected Prime Minister,  to his eternal shame, had compromised Indian intelligence and so India was not able to either respond  and take adequate measures. The Kashmir Genocide was the result of I K Gujral's policy of appeasing Pakistan by disarming Indian intelligence and in Iran too Hamid Ansari as shown in Mission R &AW the same tragedy unfolded. 

The spate of targeted killings began in 2021 when an attempt was made on Hafiz Saeed. This terrorist escaped death and has been in hiding ever since. He is a UN designated terrorist and almost all terrorists killed during the course of the past year have been associated with (1) Laskhkar-e-Taiba, (2)  Hizbul Mujahideen, and (3) Jaish-e- Mohammed. Masood Azhar who was freed in exchange for the passengers of the hijacked AI 814 to Kandhaar in December 1999 is presumed to have died in the Balakot strike, though the R&AW has not stopped tracking him. Raheem Ullah Tariq associated with J-e-M was killed on November 13th in Karachi. Akram Gazi L-e-T killer was eliminated on November 9th near a town in Pakistan occupied Pashtunistan. Kwaja Shahid was kidnapped and executed in PoK. This man was involved in the attack on an Indian Army Camp at Sunjerwan in Kashmir. Shaid Latif who belonged to J-e-M and was the plotter behind the Pathankot attack was killed by unknown gunmen in Sialkot. In September Riaz Ahmed the mastermind of terror attacks in Kahsmir was killed in PoK. In Karachi Mufti Kasim Farooqi who had shifted to a new location was traced and killed. A month earlier, Hafiz Saeed's right hand man, Hussein Arain was killed in Sindh. IN Rawalpindi, in March 2023 Bashir Ahmed Pir of the Hizbul Mujahideen was eliminated. In Karachi again, Khalid Raza of the ul-Badr- Mujahideen was killed. Nepal too has witnessed the killing of India wanted terrorists like Lal Mohammed. 

India clearly and categorically denies involvement in these killings. And I have no reason not to believe what the Government of India says. As I have said, there may be intent but capability is a totally different order of magnitude. It is likely that a groups of Army Officers in Pakistan who are not favorably disposed towards the regime in power there are behind the killings and they may get assistance from patriots.

The Nine Lives of Pakistan Dispatches' from A Divided Land by Declan Walsh A Review

A look at the world of politics, statecraft, diplomacy and books

The Nine Lives of Pakistan Dispatches from a Divided Land

Declan Walsh

Bloomsbury 2021

I heard of this book in a YouTube pod cast of the Lahore Book Club presented by Shri Adnan Moiz and since I am a keen observer of the Islamic Republic of Pakistan and have been following the byzantine politics of the Garrison State rather closely. The dramatic events leading to the exit of Shri Imran Khan has had the nation transfixed even as the Soap Opera unfolded over an entire month. It seems that the Establishment, the Paistani euphemism for its Deep State consisting of the Army and its Secret Service finally had its way. 

This book by Declan Walsh, a correspondent of the New York Times and The Guardian, who spent a decade covering Pakistan from the closing years of the Premiership of Benazir Bhutto through the years of Nawaz Sheriff follows the developments on the political stage by in-depth interviews with men and women not the movers and shakers but humble folks. Friends in low places help us understand reality better than friends perched higher up the ladder. He seeks out human rights activists like the woman lawyer Asma Jehangir, the "encounter specialist" of the Karachi Police and follows the adventurers of a true believer in the Islamic Jihad, Colonel Imran as he sped from Taliban hideouts in Waziristan to a dusty death on the road to Peshawar. Like a cat Pakistan has had Nine Lives and how many of them has it used.

The Islamic Republic of Pakistan made wrong political and ideological choices and the society is paying a huge price for them. The whole idea of Pakistan as a home for Indian Muslims which culminated in the state being created by the British did not involve even the courtesy of a perfunctory consultation with the indigenous populations of the region that came to be called Pakistan. Thus Punjab, Sindh, North West Frontier Province now called Khyber Pukhtunwa  were not taken into confidence. The result is the huge fault line the divides the Mohajirs from India and the rest of the population. The Mohajirs are a discriminated lot and have turned to urban terrorism in Karachi in order to carve out political space for themselves. The MQM is a potent political force and its exiled leader Altaf is able to control the city from his exile in London. 

The other fault line is more elemental and this goes back to 1893 when the Durand Line was established. I have given the link of my study of the Durand Line here.https://wordcraftandstatecraft.blogspot.com/2021/09/the-great-game-all-over-again-durand.html. The Historical and geopolitical aspects of the 1893 Boundary are spelt out in my essay. More important is the fact that Zia ul Haq the Military Dictator of Pakistan walked into the American trap in Afghanistan with his eyes wide shut. A Soviet occupied Afghanistan could have been prevailed upon to accept the Durand Line as the international border. Instead the Pakistani Army and its ISI entered th war against the Soviets by acting as conduits for supplying weapons and arms to the "mujahudeedn" the freedom fighters who were recruited on a pan Islamic basis thereby laying the foundation for the Global Jihad that we see all around us. The second mistake was to fall under American threats and signing up on the War on Terror in 2001. US for reasons that are as yet unclear decided that al Qaeda was behind the attack on the Twin Towers in New York on 9/11. Consequently Pakistani Army was forced to fight the very Taliban it had created trained and helped capture power in Afghanistan. Now the War of Terror turned out to be a disaster both for Pakistan and Afghanistan. The unrestricted use of drones in their war killed large number of civilian non combatants. Link:http://bahuvirupaksha.joeuser.com/article/426514/president-barack-obamas-play-station-war In this Essay we have assessed the impact of Drone attacks and Declan Walsh has drawn attention to the fact that only Imran Khan condemned the attacks. The American War on Terror turned Pakistan into an enemy and the Taliban have not forgotten that betrayal and unfortunately the Army and its leadership seems to be quite indifferent to the ground reality.

The most fascinating part of the book is his use of personal stories to flesh out the rancid realities of politics in Pakistan. The life of the Imam of the Red Mosque who became the founding member of the TeT and the life of Salmaan Taseer are both done to bring out the deepening social divide in Pakistan. The western elite lead a life insulated from the harsh realities of price rise, fuel shortages, lack of medicines and health facilities while the poor have only their Allah and their religion for comfort. The result is a deadly cocktail of social unrest and religious fanaticism and Wash uses the example of Qadri the man who shot and killed Salmaan Taseer to show how deep the poison of religion has seeped. And this toxic legacy is here to stay.

Walsh is careless in his research. On page 70 he writes that Gandhi was killed by the RSS. This narrative was pushed by Nehru and his cohorts but the reality is that the Courts and three Commissions of Inquiry appointed by the Government of India has shown conclusively that the RSS had nothing to do with the killing of Gandhi. By lining Gandhi's assassination with the RSS Nehru sought to gain political mileage in the  days  following the Partition. It is not necessary for a western journalist to repeat this canard even in a book for a general audience. 

I liked this book as I am familiar with the main events. However there are larger questions that Walsh ignores. Pakistan today is caught in a quagmire of Jihadi inspired militancy, Taliban assertion, Baluchi resistance and Sindhi Nationalism. Its survival is now seriously in doubt as the leaders have made wrong choices at each and every critical moment of its history. The War on Terror is the most recent and accepting Chinese loans for the CPEC is another. India will watch what is happening and will not interfere.