Increasing jihadi attacks in cities have reached a point from where the next jump would be much more devastating for the nation. While these attacks are called terrorist acts the world over, jihad is actually something different. As explained by several e-mails before the blast, it means that the devastating bomb blasts are a religious duty of every Muslim to kill the non-believers. Those who do not participate in jihad are not doing their duty. But not every Muslim thinks like this but this is a small section only.

Knowledgeable members of Intelligence agencies and police assess that there are 60,000 jihadis in different parts of India. Formerly, these types of attacks were conducted by the ISI with the help of sleeping cells. An outfit named SIMI was born. It gained strength during the rise of Osama Bin Laden. SIMI members used to sell Osama literature, cassettes and photos. The media noticed this at many places in UP.

After covering around half the districts in UP, SIMI gradually spread throughout the country. From recent blasts in four State capitals, it boldly rechristened itself Indian Mujahideen. After the blasts in Ahmedabad and a large catch of explosives in Surat, the Gujarat Police caught hold of Abu Bashir, the mastermind of Indian Mujahideen from Azamgarh. Gujarat Police, assisted by UP Police, unearthed an undesirable part of the terror network in north India. The Delhi serial bomb blasts opened the eyes of the general public to it.

Some Jamia students were involved in these dastardly acts of terror, which killed around 30 people in Delhi alone. Raids were conducted in the narrow bylanes of Jamia Nagar. Two jihadis were killed on the spot, two arrested while two escaped. A police inspector, Mohan Chand Sharma, was killed by the terrorists. This raid was conducted as the police had concrete information. But the local Muslim population was soon up in arms against the raiding police party.

Within two days, the Jamia students started protesting. Meetings of Muslim students were held and addressed by fiery speakers. These speeches were quite provocative, saying that Muslims were under attack and that they should fight. Elements connected with SIMI, its clone Indian Mujahideen, and the madarsa cadre who had been working underground in the campus, surfaced boldly. They claimed that the students allegedly involved in the Delhi blasts were innocent. They also alleged that Sharma's own colleagues shot him.

These Muslims raised a lot of questions about the raid. Why didn't the police take permission from the local MLA? Why didn't they first inform the mohalla committee? The most bizarre demand was that of raid should have been conducted by Muslim policemen.

The raiding of suspected terrorist hideouts faces the resistance of Muslim masses in general. This is not new. In 1995, after the serial bomb blasts in Hyderabad, a suspect was arrested. During interrogation he revealed that he was trained by ISI in Islamabad. He also disclosed about his associates and told the police how he arrived in India via Kathmandu with arrangements for staying for a day in a Patna mosque on his way to Hyderabad.

The Hyderabad and Bihar police planned a raid in the wee hours. But the Imam ran to the minaret loudspeaker and gave a call to Muslims to assemble at the mosque. He aroused their religious sentiments. As a result, thousands of Muslims gathered there within a few minutes. The raiding party was under siege. They rang up high officials who, in turn, ran to the Chief Minister. Instantly the raiding police party was withdrawn. The police party had to escape through the backdoor.

This is not the story of just one raid. It is a pattern. It could not materialise in Jamia Nagar. But during the second half of the raid, the anger against police action was raging among the local Muslims. But as Sharma was killed, they could not do much.

The jihadis who escaped were from Azamgarh that has acquired notoriety of producing scores of terrorists and the mafia. Having obtained the clues from arrested terrorists about the whereabouts of the perpetrators of serial blasts in Delhi, the Delhi Police, accompanied by the UP Police, went to Azamgarh to flush out those responsible for the blasts. House-to-house searches were conducted in Sarai Mir and Sanjarpur.

Cops were looking for Sajid, Salman, Khalid and Mohd Arif. Their families said they had had no communication with them from four months. Documents and CDs pertaining to the blasts were recovered during these searches. These are only few examples. Azamgarh has a horrendous history of riots. After a recent riot, a jihadi proudly told a media person that Azamgarh would turn into another Kashmir.

Indian security agencies must get ready to face such a serious situation.

Courtesy: www.dailypioneer.com, September 28, 2008