National

Lashkar lynchpin killed

SRINAGAR: Police in Jammu and Kashmir have identified a Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) operative killed on Thursday as the long-missing lynchpin who provided logistical support to the December 2005 attack on the Indian Institute of Science in Bangalore.

Known only by the code-names Abu Atif and Sadaaq, the Lashkar commander is believed to have supplied the weapons and crack fidayeen who carried out the IISc. attack, as well as a December 31, 2007 strike on a Central Reserve Police Force training base in Rampur, Uttar Pradesh.

A special unit of the Anantnag Police shot dead Abu Atif along with his personal bodyguard, Syed Moin, inside an underground Lashkar safehouse in the village of Batpora, near Pulwama. Police sources said investigators had located the safehouse after learning that the Lashkar commander, a Pakistani national from the district of Gujranwala in Punjab province, had married a local woman, Mubina Akhtar. Ms. Akhtar has been detained for questioning.

During his 10-year tenure in Jammu and Kashmir, Abu Atif is alleged to have been involved in over 100 killings, mainly of civilians. However, his operations included a 2006 attack which claimed the life of Pampore police Station House Officer, Inspector Manzoor Ahmad. He was the most important figure in the Lashkar’s south Kashmir organisational structure, Anantnag Senior Superintendent of Police Nitish Kumar told The Hindu.

LeT spokesperson Abdullah Ghaznai, who is known only by his code-name, paid tributes to Abu Atif, who he described as the organisation’s divisional commander for southern operations. Abdul Ghaznavi said the commander was responsible for several extremely successful operations, although he did not offer details. While Lashkar headquarters often mourns the loss of top commanders it almost never accepts responsibility for operations which have claimed civilian lives.

Much of the information on Abu Atif’s role in the IISc. and Rampur strikes has come from Sabahuddin Ahmad, a Bihar resident arrested by the Uttar Pradesh police in February. Alleged to be the first Indian national to ever command a Lashkar operational squad, Mr. Ahmad has been identified by police in Karnataka and Uttar Pradesh as the head of the Lashkar teams which carried out the IISc. and Rampur operations.

Having trained with the Lashkar in Jammu and Kashmir’s Surankote mountains and at camps in Pakistan, police said, Mr. Ahmad returned to India several months before the IISc. attack. He enrolled at Presidency College for a bachelor’s degree in Business Administration. Abu Atif later despatched the fidayeen, who carried out the attack, to Mr. Ahmad’s apartment at the Coffee Board Colony in Bangalore, along with an assault rifle.

Investigators say Abu Atif also provided assault rifles and highly- trained Lashkar fidayeen operatives for the Rampur attacks. Two Pakistani nationals sent by Abu Atif to execute the Rampur operation were also arrested along with Mr. Ahmad. Imran Boota, a resident of Pakistan’s Gujaranwala district who operated under the code-name Abu Jaar, and Farooq Azam, a resident of Muzaffarabad in Pakistan-occupied Jammu and Kashmir who used the code-name Abu Osama, are awaiting trial.

Intelligence sources said Abu Atif had also been ordered to provide logistical support for the operation Mr. Ahmad was planning at the time of his arrest — a fidayeen attack on the Stock Exchange building in Mumbai. Mr. Ahmad, they believe, planned to replicate the tactics used in Bangalore and Rampur to stage the assault.

He was also considering an attack on the Bhabha Atomic Research Centre complex in Mumbai.

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