Masood Azhar: India’s Most Wanted

The Pulwama terror attack has once again brought into focus Masood Azhar, one of the dreaded terrorists in the world. Masood’s Jaish-e-Mohammad (JeM) has claimed responsibility for the attack in which 42 jawans, including two from Odisha, were martyred on Thursday.

Masood is one terror element who has always remained in the radar of India’s security establishment, yet he has managed to inflict maximum damage to the armed forces over the years. And he has lived a life with impunity under the protection of Pakistan.

Who would have forgotten the infamous deal struck by the then External Affairs Minister Jaswant Singh and the Atal Bihari Bajpayee government in 1999 for his release in exchange of more than 150 Indian hostages aboard the hijacked Indian Airlines plane which was taken to Kandahar in Afghanistan.

Jaswant Singh had to bear the ignominy of flying with this dreaded terrorist and two others such as Mushtaq Ahmed Zargar and Omar Sheikh in the same aircraft to Kandahar for the release of the Indian hostages. Though India had limited options available in those days and diplomatic maneuvering space to ensure the safety of the hijacked Indians through other means, the fact remains Masood’s release has proved costly for India. He has come back to haunt India again and again.

Masood went on to form the JeM soon after the Kandahar hijack episode, with the support of then-al-Qaeda chief Osama bin Laden and the Afghan Taliban, according to the United Nations. And from then on, JeM has let lose a rein of terror on India. It has since made history through a series of dastardly attacks on Indian targets.

JeM carried out the sensational Parliament attack in 2004 and was also responsible for an attack on an Indian airbase in the town of Pathankot in 2016, killing at least six people.

Later that year, JeM was linked to an attack on an Indian security forces base at Uri, killing 19 people. India retaliated with the surgical strike across the LoC, but it seems to have failed to deter him from causing deadly terror attacks in India.

“He sang like a canary” a former intelligence officer who had once interrogated Masood in an Indian jail recalled.

According to security experts, what endears him to Pakistan is his ability to convince fresh recruits. He is a “rabble rouser” who can twist events in India to entice the youth into JeM  fold.  “His physique itself is completely at odds with physical training, but he more than makes up with his ability to follow instructions, and convert his hate into a rabble rousing ideology”.

Pakistan has arrested him under international pressure and has outlawed the JeM, but according to the security establishment, they are just hogwash. The truth is Pakistan has continued to shield him. China too, whose ties with Pakistan has only strengthened over the years, has consistently blocked India’s attempt to list Masoor as a global terrorist.

NDA ally Shiv Sena, has now demanded that Indian forces enter Pakistan and eliminate Masood Azhar.

What stops China from declaring Masood a global terrorist? China and Pakistan are believed to be ‘all-weather friends’, and Beijing often views New Delhi as a competitor and, even a threat. Supporting Azhar could be a way to needle India and appease Pakistan, security experts have said. They also feel that China is holding a grudge against India for giving asylum to Tibetan spiritual leader Dalai Lama in 1959, after China occupied Tibet in 1950.