Sunday, September 1, 2002		Books

Into the minds of merchants of death
Jaswant Singh

Most Wanted: Profiles of terror
edited by Harinder Baweja; Roli Books, New Delhi, Pages 144, Rs 195.

WANT to make acquaintance with purveyors of death, training their guns mainly on India? Here is a list of six, four of them Islamic fundamentalists. These profiles have been prepared by journalists from India and Pakistan who came in contact with these merchants of death in the course of their professional duties.

Apart from giving the background of their militant mindset, the write-ups also provide a glimpse of their modus operandi, their beliefs and motives and how they rouse innocent people to follow their bloody course. K.P.S. Gill, in his introduction, draws heavily on his experience of tackling militancy in Punjab to maintain that it is not possible to get the militants to the negotiation table without first defeating them on the ground.

The first in the list is the man President Bush wants "dead or alive", Osama bin Laden. Rahimullah Yususzai, a Pakistani journalist, charts Osama’s life from his childhood in Saudi Arabia. Incensed by the presence of "infidel’ Americans in his country, he pledged to take revenge on them. Later, he added Israel and India to his hit-list. Hounded out of his homeland, he first settled in Sudan and then in Afghanistan where he found in the Taliban a perfect ally to fulfil his plans. The US action in Afghanistan and the fall of the Taliban did not change him a bit. He is believed to have escaped the USbombings and from his unidentified hide-out, he calls upon Muslims all over the world to carry on his jehad.

When the Government of India released Maulana Masood Azhar and two others in exchange for the passengers of IC-814, hijacked from Kathmandu to Kandahar in December 1999, they did not realise (in the words of Harinder Baweja) that he was a live bomb that had been ticking all the six years that he was behind bars. Today, his Jaish-e-Mohammad is one of the most dreaded terrorist outfits in Kashmir. Now, under US pressure, Gen Pervez Musharraf has put him in detention, but this detention is rather symbolic. He is able to contact anyone outside, and continues to direct the activities of his Jaish.

For Prof Hafiz Mohammad Saeed, chief of Lashkar-e-Toiba, records Amir Mir, another Pakistani journalist, killing is a ‘pious’ man’s obligation, and the professor considers himself a very ‘pious’ man. His outfit has to account for more than 15000 lives in Kashmir, including those of a large number of Lashkar-e-Toiba militants. Since its launch in 1991, the Lashkar has set up six military training camps in Pakistan and Pakistan-held Kashmir, 2500 offices in Pakistan and two dozen launching camps along the Line of Control.

Mohammad Yusuf Shah, alias Syed Salahuddin, Supreme Commander of the Hizbul Mujahideen, has been marked by the Indian authorities as one of their most wanted men. His followers call him "Pir sahib" and believe that he possesses supernatural powers, records Zafar Meraj, an Indian journalist.

The Hizbul Mujahideen was set up in 1989 by merging different jehadi groups. Today, Salahuddin commands his "boys" from his base in Pakistan-held Kashmir with the help of a highly modern communication network.

Indian journalist Subir Bhaumik charts the career of railway porter-turned-militant, Paresh Barua who claims to be the Commander-in-Chief of the United Liberation Front of Asom (ULFA). Even though his violent movement has almost petered out, he still fancies himself as a modern-day Lachit Barphukan, who defeated the Mughal army in 1672. His passion for Assam’s freedom has not waned and he is convinced that it is not a wasted dream. "The struggle has just begun," he maintains.

The man who ordered the assassination of Rajiv Gandhi and later acknowledged it as a mistake, is a kind of cult figure who has indoctrinated men and women of the LTTE (Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam) to the extent that they renounce their family ties, friends and marital pleasures. Velupilai Prabhakaran never initiates an assassination without worshipping Kali, the Mother Goddess who combines in herself the creative and destructive attributes of the Supreme Power. His followers are totally devoted to the idea of a Tamil state in Sri Lanka and have abiding loyalty to Prabhakaran.

R. Rajagopalan records that the LTTE has carried out at least five times the number of suicide attacks than all other similar organisations put together.