Masood Azhar lying low, but is quite active
He is avoiding attention in the wake of the US Financial Action Task Force move against Pakistan earlier this year.
Jaish-e-Mohammad leader Maulana Masood Azhar is very much alive and he is not only interacting with the cadre, but also continues to give his anti-India speeches from his headquarters in Bahwalpur in Punjab province of eastern Pakistan. A section of the media had earlier reported that the 50-year-old chief of the banned terrorist outfit was seriously ill.
Many Pakistan- based sources have confirmed to The Sunday Guardian that Azhar, who along with Lashkar-e-Tayyaba chief Hafiz Saeed was one of the reasons for Pakistan being put on the grey list of the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) in June earlier this year, is just lying low to avoid attention in the wake of FATF action against Pakistan.
Jaish is one of the most potent organisations that is used by the Pakistani deep state to carry out terror attacks against Indian forces in Jammu and Kashmir as well as against Baloch freedom fighters.
In the second week of Oc- tober, a nine-member delegation, comprising members of FATF’s Asia Pacific Group (APG), that included experts from the British Scotland Yard, US Department of Treasury, Financial Intelligence Unit of Mal- dives, Indonesian Ministry of Finance, People’s Bank of China and Justice Department of Turkey, had visited Pakistan to oversee the steps taken by the Islamic state to curb terror financing.
Sources said that Azhar’s security has been drastically increased earlier this year over fear that Indian agencies might try to assassinate him because of the numerous high profile attacks, especially on Indian military establishments, that he had carried out.
He mostly spends his time in the garrison town of Baha- walpur in a well-protected madrasa under the watchful eye of armed security escorts that also include government officials in plainclothes. The high-walled madrasa, Usman-o-Ali, is less than 5 km from the XXXI Corps headquarters of the Pakistani army that has close to 70,000 Pakistani soldiers, including an infantry and armored division.
In order to create a smoke screen that they have taken action against him, the Pakistan army’s notorious intelligence arm ISI has asked Azhar not to address people publicly and make sure that when he does so, no recording instrument, either video or audio, is allowed near him. “He has always been someone who shies away from leaving any kind of footprints. That makes it more difficult for any security agency to track him. His latest picture that is available with the agencies was taken many years ago and for many of the agency officials, he is considered as more damaging to India than other terror leaders who are operating from Pakistan,” an official of a security agency said. Preparations by the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in West Bengal for the Lok Sabha elections have started to gain momentum after Durga Puja celebrations that concluded in the state last week. According to sources in the BJP in Bengal, the party is busy shortlisting candidates for the 42 Lok Sabha seats in the state.
Party workers and prospective candidates are already making a beeline to their respective district presidents and also to senior leaders of the state at the BJP state party office in Kolkata with their resumes in a bid to secure a ticket. The party has started holding meetings with their district level workers and district presidents in the state to shortlist candidates for the 42 Lok Sabha seats from the state. The party aims to win 22 of the 42 Lok Sabha seats from the state and has made Bengal one of the party’s focus states for the Lok Sabha elections in 2019.
A senior BJP leader told The Sunday Guardian, “There are a lot of resumes that we are getting from different party workers from across the state for their candidature to the Lok Sabha elections, but we are in the process of shortlisting them. We will also have to look at the winability of the candidate from the respective seat along with other equations in each seat before we decide on the candidature of the person from any seat.”
The Bharatiya Janata Party had contested all the 42 seats in the 2014 Lok Sabha polls, but the party managed to win only two seats from the state. However, ever since the 2014 Lok Sabha elections, the party has seen a significant growth in the state in terms of its vote share and presence in the state.
Another senior BJP leader said: “Bengal is a very important state for the BJP as far as the 2019 elections are concerned. We have gained a huge ground in the state and the party is looking to make a great impact in the state. Even the senior leadership is very serious about Bengal. The party is likely to field all of its Chief Ministers to campaign in Bengal, while Union ministers would also be a part of the campaign for the party in Bengal.”
Sources in the BJP also told this newspaper that the party is likely to finalise the names of candidates before the “Rath Yatra” scheduled to start from 5 December across all the districts and Vidhan Sabha constituencies of the state, so that the candidates can start preparing their ground for the election much in advance.
However, the party would not disclose the names of the candidates in public before the elections are declared, fearing backlash and threats from the ruling Trinamool Congress to the candidates, the source said.
The “Rath Yatra” will be launched from Tarapith in Birbhum distirct by the party’s national president, Amit Shah. The party is believed to have a strong presence in Birbhum district.
The Yatra would have three chariots, each starting from different locations and covering 14 seats each. While on its way, it would stop at important locations for rallies and other programmes planned by the party units in the respective districts.
The Yatra would conclude in Kolkata on 23 January, the birthday of Netaji Subhash Chandra Bose, and the occasion is likely to be addressed by Prime Minister Narendra Modi in Kolkata’s Brigade Parade Ground.