LAHORE: A spokesman for Prof Hafiz Mohammad Saeed, the founder of the Pakistan-based Kashmiri militant group Lashkar-e-Toiba (LeT), who now heads Jamaatul Daawa (JuD), has refuted the Indian media reports about the involvement of the Lashkar in the Mumbai carnage.
A close associate of the former Saeed told this scribe on phone in Lahore that the Lashkar-e-Toiba had shifted its base from Pakistan to Jammu Kashmir in 2001 after Hafiz Saeed resigned and announced he would now lead an Islamic charity, Jamaatud Dawa (JUD, or Party of the Calling). The spokesman said technically speaking he was not in a position to speak on behalf of the Lashkar but the fact remains that it has nothing to do with the Mumbai carnage.
“The Mumbai bloodbath seems to have been carried out by those who wanted to create more problems for Indian Muslims. Deccan Mujahideen is surely a fake name just to create confusion. We do know an Indian jehadi group with the name of Indian Mujahideen but this Deccan Mujahideen is a new thing which is aimed at implicating the Muslims in the carnage. Even otherwise, let me make it clear that the followers of Hafiz Mohammad Saeed simply do not believe in killing innocent civilians. I believe the Lashkar spokesman in Jammu & Kashmir will officially deny its involvement in the Mumbai carnage today”, he added. The kid’s glove approach of the Pakistani establishment towards Hafiz Saeed can be gauged from the freedom with which he leads Friday prayers at the Lahore mosque where he exhorts his followers to take up the path of jehad against India and the United States with renewed vigour. Not only that he is allowed to move freely, he is free to host parties for political leaders and hold conferences to promote the cause of jehad. For instance, addressing thousands of youngsters at the ’Kashmir Solidarity Conference’ in Lahore recently, Hafiz Saeed said the time was ripe to take the war onto the Indian soil for liberating Kashmir. “Washington and New Delhi are already engaged in a proxy war against Pakistan and it is high time Islamabad declare jehad against them to protect the security and integrity of Pakistan”. Interestingly, the gathering was organised by the Jamaatul Daawah with due permission by the Punjab government and was chaired by Saeed.
Despite being declared a terrorist outfit by US State Department and placed on the terror watch list of the Pakistani government by the Musharraf regime in the past, the Jamaatul Daawa, formerly known as the Lashkar-e-Toiba (LeT) has been enjoying considerable freedom across Pakistan to raise funds and recruit cadre. Despite a government interdiction, banners can easily be seen in the urban and rural areas of the Punjab, urging young boys to enroll themselves with Jamaat-ul-Dawa and Lashkar-e-Toiba for waging jehad against infidels. The banners usually carry the telephone numbers of the area offices so that the young men interested in military training can contact the jehadi group.
Similarly, the Lashkar and the Dawa activists can be seen outside mosques in the rural areas distributing pamphlets and periodicals preaching the virtues of jehad in Kashmir, Palestine, Chechnya, Kosovo and Eritrea besides vowing that it would plant the flag of Islam in Washington, Tel Aviv and the New Delhi. The Lashkar leadership describes the Hindus and Jews as the main enemies of Islam while claiming India and Israel to be the main enemies of Pakistan.
The donation boxes of the Lashkar and the Jamaat that had disappeared soon after the 9/11 attacks and a subsequent government swoop against the outfits, have already reappeared on public places as well as mosques across Pakistan. However, most of the JuD funds still come in the form of anonymous donations being sent directly to its bank accounts from various parts of the world. The rapidly growing Jamaatul Dawa and its leadership even raise funds on the internet. Some insiders believe that the Jamaat has raised so much money, mostly from sympathetic Wahhabis in Saudi Arabia that it now plans to open its own bank.
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Background:
The Lashkar-e-Toiba was blamed for bomb attacks on markets in New Delhi that killed more than 60 people in 2005, as well as an assault on Indian parliament in 2001 that brought India and Pakistan to the brink of a fourth war. An estimated 200,000 people participated in Jamaat-ud Dawa’s rally held last week in the central Punjab city of Muridke [which houses its sprawling headquarters]indicating that the movement has grown in strength despite Islamabad’s claim of crackdown on Jihadist organisations. The LeT’s main focus is jehad against India, which it considers an enemy of Islam. A party document declared that the group is fighting not only liberate Kashmir, but re-establish Muslim rule in whole of India. LeT is said to have developed a strong network in India among radical Muslims.