3

Jan

Mumbai terror attack :Behind Move to Extradite Hafiz Saeed

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Today’s Edition

New Delhi, 3 January 2024

Satish Misra

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There is more to than meets the ordinary eye in India request to Pakistan to extradite 26/11 Mumbai terror attack mastermind Hafiz Saeed to India at this point in time. A calculated move aimed to reap rich political dividends?  

India has sent a request to Pakistan to extradite Hafiz Saeed to India, External Affairs Ministry spokesperson Arindam Bagchi told newspersons on Friday- December 29, 2023.

Experts and intelligence sources said that the request has indeed been timed so that the ruling Modi establishment could reap rich electoral harvest in case Islamabad decides to heed to New Delhi’s request and if not then the propaganda machine would impregnate popular mind glory of Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

Request has been made keeping in mind the coming general elections in Pakistan on 8 February next year. There is a strong likelihood of return to power of former Pakistan Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif who has been an ardent champion of better ties with India. Off late Sharif has been praising the progress made by India in his interviews and statements.  

Nawaz Sharif had visited India to attend in the swearing in ceremony of Prime Minister Narendra Modi in May 2014. PM Modi had made an unscheduled stopover in Lahore to wish Sharif on his 66th birthday in December 2015. Modi was returning from Kabul after paying a visit there. Modi was received at the Allama Iqbal International Airport with a warm hug by the Pakistan Prime Minister then.

Sources said that country’s foreign policy and security establishment’s assessment is that if Sharif comes to power then he may in all likelihood respond to India’s request which will be very close to the Lok Sabha polls. Policy makers are expecting the return of the Pakistan Muslim League (N) to power because Pakistan’s military covert support to Sharif who returned to Pakistan from exile in October this year.

Famous Bus diplomacy under which former Prime Minister Atal Bihar Vajpayee travelled to Lahore in a bus on 19 February 1999 inaugurating the bus service from Delhi to Lahore where he was received by Prime Minister Sharif. It was done to promote people to people contact to improve relations between the two countries.

In short, the Modi regime’s expectations are high as it calculates the return to power of the PML (N) with Nawaz Sharif leading the government. Extraditing Saeed should not be a big issue at this time because Pakistan is reeling under economic and social problems.  Pakistan would even benefit by extraditing Saeed as it would give a boost to tis image internationally. 

India could have made the extradition request any time in the last few years but its timing now raises many questions.   

Hafiz Saeed, 71, was sentenced to 33 years in jail by a Pakistan court after being convicted in two cases of terror financing in April 2022. The case was filed by Pakistan's Counter-Terrorism Department.

He, however, has continued to evade punishment for involvement in the 26/11 terror strikes.

He has been sentenced in multiple cases of terror financing in the past. In 2020 too, he was sentenced to 15 years in jail.

He has spent years in and out of detention in varying forms in Pakistan, sometimes under house arrest. But he had roamed freely across the country and addressed incendiary speeches targeting India with impunity.

India's extradition request also comes at a time when a political front backed by the 26/11 Mumbai attacks mastermind will fight the Pakistan election. Hafiz Saeed's son and terror group Laskhar-e-Taiba leader Hafiz Talha Saeed is one of the candidates.

Hafiz Talha Saeed is considered No. 2 in the LeT, second only to his father. Last year, the Home Ministry declared him a designated terrorist under the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act.

For years, the US has offered $10 million as an award for information that could lead to Hafiz Saeed's arrest. He had been moving around freely in Pakistan as the head of the Jamaat-ud-Dawa or JuD which presents itself as a charitable organisation but is seen as a front for Lashkar-e-Taiba.

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