New Delhi, March 9 – The busting of the Faridabad module and the recent terror plot targeting temples revealed that Jaish-e-Mohammed and Lashkar-e-Taiba are increasingly engaging in home-grown activities.
Officials from the Delhi police's Special Cell say that Lashkar-e-Taiba has been scouting for illegal immigrants who have settled in South India to carry out attacks in North India.
There has been a surge in activity, especially around the Bengali camps in Kerala, where Lashkar-e-Taiba operatives are looking for individuals to carry out terror attacks, officials say.
Similar activity has also been noticed in Tamil Nadu. Recently, the Special Cell arrested six Bangladeshi nationals in Tamil Nadu with the help of the local police. The investigation revealed a larger plot, where Lashkar-e-Taiba was planning to use these individuals to attack temples in and around Delhi.
An official from the Intelligence Bureau said that to carry out these operations, Lashkar-e-Taiba has sought the help of touts who bring illegal immigrants into India. These touts provide these individuals with Aadhaar Cards and Voter IDs. The official said that the same tactic that these touts use to get these individuals to vote during elections in West Bengal and the Northeastern states is being used to make them carry out terror activities.
An official said that the touts provide them with valid documents on the condition that they vote in elections. If they fail to do so, then they are tracked and immediately sent back to either Bangladesh or Myanmar, the official said. The same tactic is being used now to recruit them into terror groups such as Lashkar-e-Taiba, the official also added.
The increase in recruitment activity coincides with the Intelligence Bureau recently warning that the elections in West Bengal and Assam could be targeted by Lashkar-e-Taiba. These terror groups are trying to take advantage of the fact that security agencies would be too busy with the elections, and hence, a slip-up could take place.
Another official explained that Lashkar-e-Taiba is deliberately not recruiting the illegal immigrants who are already present in many parts of Northeast and West Bengal. The idea to recruit from the South is because they are not familiar faces to be part of an operation in the Northeast and West Bengal.
Another official said that these illegal immigrants are either roped in by issuing threats or are paid well to undertake the job. Lashkar-e-Taiba has assured these persons that if they carry out a terror attack, then they would be paid heavily and then given easy entry back to either Bangladesh or Myanmar.
Investigations have revealed that while the recruits would be the illegal immigrants settled in South India, the handling of the operation would be overseen by persons based in Jammu and Kashmir. Special Cell officers learnt that the task to undertake terror strikes in North India, Northeast and West Bengal was handed over to one Shabbir Ahmed Lone. A resident of Ganderbal in Kashmir, Lone is currently based in Bangladesh and is overseeing the India operations for the Lashkar-e-Taiba. He had been arrested in 2007 after the police found AK-47s and grenades on him. He served a jail term until 2019, following which he fled to Bangladesh at the insistence of the Lashkar-e-Taiba.
Over the last year, Lone has built up a network and even conducted dry runs for terror attacks in Delhi and Kolkata. The Indian agencies are working closely with their counterparts in Bangladesh to nab Lone and have him extradited to India, another official said.
