The 'pretty face' of Indian
terrorism By Siddharth Srivastava
NEW DELHI -
A 19-year-old college girl, Ishrat Jahan, was shot dead
by Gujarat police along with three others with suspected
links with the terrorist group Lashkar-e-Toiba on June
15. Police claimed
that the four
were involved in a plot to assassinate Gujarat chief
minister Narender Modi.
A nationwide furor
followed the killing of Ishrat, with pictures of her
lying dead in a pool of blood on a highway, providing
much emotional grist. Nobody could imagine that a pretty
college girl who resided in Mumbai, belonging to a
regular lower-middle class family with siblings and
parents working hard to make ends meet - while ensuring
that the next generation of the family is educated -
could have anything to do with the world of terrorism.
But as facts and evidence unfolded, it became
apparent that Ishrat was involved, leading pretty much a
double life - one of which her family and friends in
college were not aware. While questions remain about why
the police had to resort to the use of ultimate force in
killing the four, there is enough evidence to show that
Ishrat kept bad company and probably aided with
reconnaissance or acted as cover for militant outfits.
Welcome to the evolving world of Indian women
terrorists.
There are several instances of
participation by women in heinous terror attacks in the
country. In the twin Gateway blasts in Mumbai on August
25, 2003 that killed 50 and injured more than 150,
Fehmida Hanif and her 15-year-old daughter acted as
covers for operations; In the December 13, 2003 attack
on the Indian parliament, Navjot Sandhu (named Afsan
after marriage) provided lodging to militants, bought
ammonium nitrate and carried out field checks at the
airport and several embassies; the gruesome killing of
late prime minister Rajiv Gandhi took place when a
Liberation Tigers of Tamil Elam (LTTE) woman suicide
bomber, Dhanu, blew up a kilogram of explosives strapped
to her body as she garlanded him at a public meeting,
with three other women forming the main support cell.
Last year, police drew up a list of India's
seven most wanted women criminals, the first time that
such an exercise has been undertaken. Recent
intelligence reports as well as briefs by Home Ministry
officials reveal that there is a new dynamism to recruit
women terrorists, even as security forces in the country
crack down on terror outfits with a new vigor. In the
recent past, there have been reports of the Jammu and
Kashmir terrorist outfit Jaish-e-Mohammed operating a
camp near Kotli in the Pakistan part of Kashmir,
exclusively training women in the handling of arms and
showing them how to act as human bombs. In a clear
departure from the norm, wherein women were used as
conduits and to provide logistical support, they are
undergoing religious indoctrination to motivate them to
fight as well as take part in deadly strikes. There are
further reports that militant groups such as the
Lashkar-e-Jabbar's women cadre - Anjuman-e-Khwateen,
headed by Najma Akhtar - are training women at their
headquarters in Pakistan-administered Kashmir, with
special emphasis on suicide attacks.
According
to security experts, the terror outfits have identified
ways to directly use women as their main protagonists.
Apart from being informed about the obvious advantage of
arousing the least suspicion, the women are being
equipped with smaller and lighter guns, such as the
Israeli Uzi sub-machine gun and the 9mm mauser, instead
of heavy machine guns, and they are sporting
rocket-propelled grenade launchers instead of throwing
grenades - which requires greater physical strength.
Internationally, women groups such as the Black
Widows of Chechnya or female suicide attackers in
Palestine and Turkey are known to be well organized,
several at the instance of their male counterparts.
Two-dozen Chechen women took part in the seizure of
about 800 hostages in a Moscow theater in October 2002
that ended with the killing of 129 people.
The
problems in Chechnya and Palestine have been ascribed to
local ethnic struggles that have seen several women as
well as their men folk as victims, forcing the situation
out of hand. There are reports that al-Qaeda may be
making inroads into these pockets, but this is more due
to an opportunity arising out of simmering discontent.
Similar has been the case with the LTTE, though the
Tamil Tiger indoctrination machinery is supposed to be
the most efficient.
Reports suggest that an
indoctrination apparatus is being cultivated against
India as well, with one such wing called the
Banaat-ul-Islam, headed by Umi Arifa, being handed the
charge of passing on cultural factors that justify the
use of violence for political ends as well as the spirit
of self-sacrifice in terrorist acts. There are several
intelligence reports that also suggest that the
Dukhtaran-e-militat, an all-women "soft terrorist"
outfit in Jammu & Kashmir, has become increasingly
active in the recent past, taking a turn toward more
deadly means.
Commentators, however, also point
to a more dangerous portend. There is an increasing
feeling of discontent among Indian Muslims, which might
be engendering a flight of such people into the gleeful
hands of terror groups, ever-ready to exploit such
situations. Police described the Gateway blasts in
Mumbai as revenge against the Gujarat riots in which
more than 2,000 Muslims were believed to be killed. The
Gujarat government, run by the Bharatiya Janata Party's
(BJP) Narendra Modi, has subsequently been strongly
censured by the courts for having destroyed evidence of
atrocities committed on Muslims. The riots happened
under former Indian prime minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee
who led a BJP government with Hindutva leanings, a
philosophy embedded in majority rule. The Gujarat riots
have been attributed as one of the important reasons
behind Vajpayee's defeat in the recent elections in the
country.
Indeed, there have been several reports
that suggest Indian Muslims, who number over 150 million
in this country of a billion-plus population and have
never been known to be a part of terror circles, are
increasingly feeling disillusioned. This, if not
curtailed, could mark the turn of the fairer sex to join
the wrong side in India's internecine battle against
terrorism.
Siddharth Srivastava is a
New Delhi based journalist.
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that the four
were involved in a plot to assassinate Gujarat chief
minister Narender Modi. 
