New Delhi: Has Jaish-e-Mohammed (JeM) chief Masood Azhar been shifted from Bahawalpur in Pakistan to Pakistan-occupied Jammu and Kashmir (PoJK)?
Latest intelligence inputs, accessed by India Today, suggest that Azhar – a terrorist proscribed by India, US and the United Nations – has been spotted in the Gilgit-Baltistan region of PoJK, more than 1,000 km from his Bahawalpur stronghold.
According to reports, Azhar was recently seen in Skardu, specifically around the Sadpara Road locality. The area hosts at least two mosques, affiliated madrasas, and multiple private and government guest houses. It is being suspected that the proscribed terrorist is lying low at the tourist hub with attractive lakes and nature parks, after Pakistan denied his presence in the country.
Indian assets have been tracking the JeM chief ever since Pakistan’s former foreign minister Bilawal Bhutto Zardari claimed that Azhar might be in Afghanistan. He even suggested that Islamabad would hand him over to India if he was found on Pakistani soil.
“If and when the Indian government shares information with us that he is on Pakistani soil, we would be more than happy to arrest him,” Bhutto told Al Jazeera in a recent interview.
Azhar had been arrested in India in 1994 for terrorist activities in Jammu and Kashmir. He was among the three terrorists India was forced to release after the hijacking of an Indian Airlines flight from Kathmandu to New Delhi in December 1999. Since then, he has masterminded several attacks in India.
Among the recent ones are the strike on Air Force Station Pathankot in 2016 and the suicide bomb attack at Pulwama in 2019 that killed 40 Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) personnel. Azhar was also responsible for the 2001 Parliament Attack.
The Jaish is aware of India’s interest in Azhar and maintains a steady flow of misinformation through its online platforms to throw intelligence operatives off the track. These include recycled audio clips of his old speeches to prove that he is still at the base in Bahawalpur.
The JeM has two known establishments at Bahawalpur. One is the Jamia Subhan Allah that was targeted by India on May 7 during Operation Sindoor and the other is Jamia Usman O Ali, a mosque located in a densely populated part of the city near his old residence close to a hospital.
This isn’t the first time that Azhar has been shifted out of Bahawalpur. After the 2019 Balakot air strikes, he was moved from Bahawalpur to a discreet safe house in Peshawar.
Azhar is not the only terrorist leader to have found refuge in Pakistan. Hafiz Saeed, co-founder of the Lashkar-e-Taiba and Hizbul Mujahideen chief Syed Salahuddin also operate from that country.
