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D did it?
Sleuths see Dawood's hand and an IM-LeT alliance
By Anupam Dasgupta & Dnyanesh Jathar
Seven months ago, Military Intelligence had submitted a report which hinted that underworld don Dawood Ibrahim was trying to use his network to dump a fresh cache of weapons on the Maharashtra-Gujarat coast. Subsequent intelligence inputs spoke of suspicious deliveries of consignments on the outskirts of Mumbai. But investigators could not confirm the delivery or the consignees. The report further spoke of Dawood's sway over the Indian Mujahideen (IM) leadership in Pakistan and his using the group's foot soldiers for terror strikes in India.
Dawood has remained a key player in the overlapping world of crime and terrorism. He has apparently flagged off many "sporadic cooperation" ventures with willing partners in crime. His link with IM is now being examined by investigators of the triple blast in Mumbai.
Mumbai Police Commissioner Arup Patnaik and intelligence agencies confirmed that there were no early warnings about the attack. The Mumbai Anti-Terrorism Squad has formed 12 teams to probe all possible angles. The load of CCTV footage gathered from cameras near the bombing sites is being reviewed, but the number of footfalls in these areas will make the task tough.
The nature of the blasts indicate that IM is back in business. Top security and intelligence officials told THE WEEK that the soft-target attacks, although not planned on a massive scale, implied a collaboration by IM and the Lashkar-e-Toiba, using Mumbai's underworld as grassroots facilitators.
A senior police officer said recent developments in the Mumbai underworld were proof of the return of the Chota Rajan gang. Apparently, Dawood was very upset with this and with the murder attempt on his brother Iqbal Kaskar, allegedly by the Rajan gang. The officer said, "Investigators will explore whether Dawood offered his network to enable IM to carry out the terror attacks in Mumbai, to show that he can still call the shots."
A senior intelligence official said, "Dawood has been instrumental in forging crime-terrorism partnerships. Bombings are generally a succession of lesser crimes that precede it." Dawood, allegedly, had helped slain al Qaeda chief Osama bin Laden through his narcotics smuggling corridors.
"Dawood's imprint behind July 13 is being looked at," said a senior intelligence official. "We will probe if the underworld criminal network was being used as a tool to engineer the blasts. At the same time we are also probing a few allied angles." Intelligence officials said the triple blasts were locally conceived. Indian jihadis are proving their skills with not so sophisticated explosives and cell phone detonators.
THE WEEK has learnt that fertilisers and petroleum-based explosives were used in the July 13 blasts. "They resembled those used by IM operatives in the blasts in the run-up to 26/11," said an intelligence official.
The involvement of a section of the near-defunct Students' Islamic Movement of India in the attacks is also being investigated. The possibility of mobile phones being used as timers to detonate the bombs has strengthened the hunch that "down-the-line operatives" were tasked with engineering the bombings. This also puts the spotlight on the role of criminals in assisting terrorists in their larger ideological missions.
Strategic experts said the July 13 blasts fall into a category of strikes where terror is used to frequently bleed an enemy after a calibrated interval. These blasts need not have any clear strategic objectives per se.
What worries Indian security officials is that the roots of 'soft target attacks' are difficult to trace. Matters get compounded by the fact that India does not have a central database to compare the forensic evidence obtained from different blast sites.
Apart from cold intelligence, the Indian security and intelligence establishment does not have real time information on Dawood's activities and movements. Naturally, it cannot conclusively establish or ascertain Dawood's role as a master facilitator. Apart from the 1993 Mumbai serial bombings, Dawood is believed to have taken interest in many anti-Mumbai projects, including 26/11.
Groomed by Pakistan's military spy agency, the Inter Services Intelligence, IM's leadership is in cahoots with the LeT and Harkat-ul-Jihad-al-Islami. Indian security officials said these anti-India terrorist formations often joined hands to send out clear political messages. The July 13 blasts thus could be a message sent out before US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton's visit to India.
During the crackdown on IM, which began in late 2007, a key IM operative, Abdus Subhan Qureshi alias Taukeer, who is an an expert techie, escaped. IM's Riyaz and Wajid Bhatkal, who had found a safe haven in Mumbai, have been absconding ever since they were named in the Jaipur, Bangalore, Ahmedabad and Delhi blasts of 2008. Intelligence agencies believe that Riyaz Bhatkal might have reached out to Dawood to plot anti-India strikes. Given Dawood's closeness to the LeT, it would not have been difficult for him to engineer a marriage of convenience between IM and the LeT for a low-key strike in Mumbai.
The Week
Sleuths see Dawood's hand and an IM-LeT alliance
By Anupam Dasgupta & Dnyanesh Jathar
Seven months ago, Military Intelligence had submitted a report which hinted that underworld don Dawood Ibrahim was trying to use his network to dump a fresh cache of weapons on the Maharashtra-Gujarat coast. Subsequent intelligence inputs spoke of suspicious deliveries of consignments on the outskirts of Mumbai. But investigators could not confirm the delivery or the consignees. The report further spoke of Dawood's sway over the Indian Mujahideen (IM) leadership in Pakistan and his using the group's foot soldiers for terror strikes in India.
Dawood has remained a key player in the overlapping world of crime and terrorism. He has apparently flagged off many "sporadic cooperation" ventures with willing partners in crime. His link with IM is now being examined by investigators of the triple blast in Mumbai.
Mumbai Police Commissioner Arup Patnaik and intelligence agencies confirmed that there were no early warnings about the attack. The Mumbai Anti-Terrorism Squad has formed 12 teams to probe all possible angles. The load of CCTV footage gathered from cameras near the bombing sites is being reviewed, but the number of footfalls in these areas will make the task tough.
The nature of the blasts indicate that IM is back in business. Top security and intelligence officials told THE WEEK that the soft-target attacks, although not planned on a massive scale, implied a collaboration by IM and the Lashkar-e-Toiba, using Mumbai's underworld as grassroots facilitators.
A senior police officer said recent developments in the Mumbai underworld were proof of the return of the Chota Rajan gang. Apparently, Dawood was very upset with this and with the murder attempt on his brother Iqbal Kaskar, allegedly by the Rajan gang. The officer said, "Investigators will explore whether Dawood offered his network to enable IM to carry out the terror attacks in Mumbai, to show that he can still call the shots."
A senior intelligence official said, "Dawood has been instrumental in forging crime-terrorism partnerships. Bombings are generally a succession of lesser crimes that precede it." Dawood, allegedly, had helped slain al Qaeda chief Osama bin Laden through his narcotics smuggling corridors.
"Dawood's imprint behind July 13 is being looked at," said a senior intelligence official. "We will probe if the underworld criminal network was being used as a tool to engineer the blasts. At the same time we are also probing a few allied angles." Intelligence officials said the triple blasts were locally conceived. Indian jihadis are proving their skills with not so sophisticated explosives and cell phone detonators.
THE WEEK has learnt that fertilisers and petroleum-based explosives were used in the July 13 blasts. "They resembled those used by IM operatives in the blasts in the run-up to 26/11," said an intelligence official.
The involvement of a section of the near-defunct Students' Islamic Movement of India in the attacks is also being investigated. The possibility of mobile phones being used as timers to detonate the bombs has strengthened the hunch that "down-the-line operatives" were tasked with engineering the bombings. This also puts the spotlight on the role of criminals in assisting terrorists in their larger ideological missions.
Strategic experts said the July 13 blasts fall into a category of strikes where terror is used to frequently bleed an enemy after a calibrated interval. These blasts need not have any clear strategic objectives per se.
What worries Indian security officials is that the roots of 'soft target attacks' are difficult to trace. Matters get compounded by the fact that India does not have a central database to compare the forensic evidence obtained from different blast sites.
Apart from cold intelligence, the Indian security and intelligence establishment does not have real time information on Dawood's activities and movements. Naturally, it cannot conclusively establish or ascertain Dawood's role as a master facilitator. Apart from the 1993 Mumbai serial bombings, Dawood is believed to have taken interest in many anti-Mumbai projects, including 26/11.
Groomed by Pakistan's military spy agency, the Inter Services Intelligence, IM's leadership is in cahoots with the LeT and Harkat-ul-Jihad-al-Islami. Indian security officials said these anti-India terrorist formations often joined hands to send out clear political messages. The July 13 blasts thus could be a message sent out before US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton's visit to India.
During the crackdown on IM, which began in late 2007, a key IM operative, Abdus Subhan Qureshi alias Taukeer, who is an an expert techie, escaped. IM's Riyaz and Wajid Bhatkal, who had found a safe haven in Mumbai, have been absconding ever since they were named in the Jaipur, Bangalore, Ahmedabad and Delhi blasts of 2008. Intelligence agencies believe that Riyaz Bhatkal might have reached out to Dawood to plot anti-India strikes. Given Dawood's closeness to the LeT, it would not have been difficult for him to engineer a marriage of convenience between IM and the LeT for a low-key strike in Mumbai.
The Week
