Iranian Trail To Pakistan

The Mumbai Police have been painstakingly investigating the Mumbai blasts ofJuly 11, 2006, in which over 180 suburban train commuters were killed by a groupof terrorists, whose identity is yet to be established. While there has not sofar been any significant break-through in the attempts of the police toestablish the identities of the actual perpetrators, who planted the improvisedexplosive devices (IEDs) in different trains, they have arrested eight people indifferent parts of the country--all Indian Muslims--who are suspected to havebeen part of a network out of which the actual perpetrators came. It has beenreported that at least some of them had clandestinely visited Pakistan forundergoing a training course in a jihadi training camp. The course reportedlyincluded lessons in the fabrication and use of IEDs.

The latest arrests in connection with the investigation were made on July 27.The names of the arrested persons have been given as Mohammad Faizal Ata-urRahman Sheikh, aged 30,  and his brother Muzammil Ata-ul-Rahman Sheikh,aged 22, who was arrested in Bangalore. On July 28, both of them were producedbefore a Mumbai Magistrate who has granted a police request for keeping them incustody till August 9 for interrogation.

The Hindu of July 29,2006, has quoted the police as having stated asfollows while requesting the Magistrate to approve their police custody forinterrogation: "The two have clandestinely travelled to Pakistan throughIran, which they have admitted. These persons were received on the internationalborder by members of a banned terrorist organisation and taken to a terroristtraining camp in Pakistan. They underwent training in the handling  and useof sophisticated firearms and the making and use of explosive devices similar tothose used in the train blasts. Preliminary interrogation of the two revealedthat they are members of a large network of like-minded persons, who are learntto have assembled and planted the explosive devices."

A number of questions arise from what has been stated by the police in theirremand application: Are the arrested persons Sunnis or Shias? Were they the onlypersons who travelled via Iran or were there others  too? Where did theyget the Iranian visas? Were the visas given on their  passports or on plainsheets of paper? Or, did they clandestinely travel via Iran without visas?Wherefrom did they get the Pakistani visas? On their passports or plain piecesof paper? Who suggested to them that they travel via Iran? What role did theIranian and Pakistani authorities play in facilitating their travel via Iranianterritory and entry into Pakistan?

These questions need to be carefully probed. In the past, jihadi terroristsfrom India clandestinely going to Pakistan for training had either crossed theLine of Control in Jammu and Kashmir or the international border or travelled byfishing boats or by commercial airlines via Kathmandu or Dubai. Travellingthrough Dubai has become risky since 9/11 because of the reported increase inthe presence of the US intelligence in the United Arab Emirates to monitor the activities of the jihadi elements in the UAE territory and hawala (informalmoney transfer) transactions through Dubai.

The arrested persons would not have chosen the Iranian route unless they hadbeen assured by someone that they would have no difficulty in travelling to andfrom Pakistan via Iranian territory. Since 2003, the terrorists of Al Qaeda andother member organisations of the International Islamic Front (IIF) travellingfrom Pakistan-Afghanistan to Iraq to operate against the American and Iraqitroops have been transiting via Iran. There were reports from reliable sourcesthat the Iranian authorities were aware of their transit, but closed their eyesto it.

Were they similarly aware of the transit of Indian jihadi terrorists toPakistan via Iranian territory for training  and did they close their eyesto it too? 

It is also necessary to probe how the Kenyan authorities after having claimedto have arrested Abdul Karim Tunda, an Indian Muslim belonging to theLashkar-e-Toiba (LET) wanted in over 30 cases of terrorist attacks in India,subsequently denied this. This reminded me  of something that happened inthe early 1980s. Talwinder Singh Parmar of the Babbar Khalsa, Vancouver, waswanted for trial in India in connection with many acts of terrorism in Punjab.He had also held out threats to have Mrs Indira Gandhi, the then Prime Minister,assassinated. At the request of the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI), theINTERPOL had  issued an alert for him.

One day, a West German Police officer while checking the passport of a Sikh,who had travelled by train from Zurich, noticed that the holder of the passportwas Talwinder Singh. He immediately arrested him under the INTERPOL alert andhis superiors informed their counterpart in the Indian Government about thearrest. The West German Police was requested to hold him in custody so that aCBI officer could be sent with the dossier on Talwinder Singh in order to seekhis handing-over to India for trial.

The CBI prepared the dossier and an officer and a legal adviser  werenominated to travel to West Germany with the dossier and the West Germanauthorities were informed of  their travel plans. Just before theirdeparture , the Indian Consul in Vancouver sent a message stating that whileaddressing a religious congregation at a Vancouver gurudwara, Talwinder Singhhad made a virulent attack on Mrs Gandhi and held out threats against her. Wetold the Indian Consul that Talwinder Singh was in police custody in WestGermany and hence could not have addressed a congregation at a local gurudwara.After verifying, the Consul confirmed the identity of Talwinder Singh.

When we checked up with the West German police, they told us that the WestGerman Foreign Office had asked them to expel Talwinder Singh back to Canadafrom where he had come. The West German Foreign Office, when contacted by us,tried to shift the blame to the CBI and alleged that they had to send him backto Vancouver since there was a delay in the CBI officer coming with the dossierto West Germany. This was factually not correct.

Later, in June1985, Talwinder Singh played an active role in the blowing upof the Kanishka plane of Air India off the Irish coast killing all its crew andpassengers.

B. Raman is Additional Secretary (retd), Cabinet Secretariat, Govt. ofIndia, New Delhi, and, presently, Director, Institute For Topical Studies,Chennai