Title: Ominous indications
Author: Editorial
Publication: Daily Pioneer
Date: Apr 02, 2002
URL: http://www.dailypioneer.com/archives1/secon3.asp?cat=\edit2&d=EDITS&fdnam=apr202

There has been some disturbing news from across the border that should cause serious concern in New Delhi.

One of them is about the reported grant of citizenship to terrorist-cum-don Dawood Ibrahim whose immediate extradition India had sought a couple of months ago. The second is of the Lahore High Court's order to release the Lashkar-e-Toiba ideologue, Professor Hafiz Sayeed, and his directive to terror groups operating in Kashmir to step up violence, albeit quietly. Viewing these two news items alongside others from Pakistan in the last two months, and the blast at Raghunath Temple in Jammu last Saturday that killed 10 persons, including four security forces personnel, it is not difficult to see that another summer of bloodletting lies ahead of India. In this context, the timing of Dawood Ibrahim's baptism as a Pakistan national is a clear rebuff to India and its concern over terrorism. By according citizenship to the most wanted criminal and terrorist in Asia, Islamabad has made clear its intention to protect him at any cost. Dawood is too precious an asset of Pakistan's intelligence agencies to be handed over to India to stand trial. He could undo, brick-by-brick, the entire edifice of civility that Islamabad has been trying to manufacture to hoodwink the world into believing that Pakistan was not a terrorist State. He knows too many secrets. Moreover, the entire exercise has occurred when President Musharraf plans to anoint himself as President for five years through a pre-election referendum. A pliable but extremely resourceful criminal syndicate, like the one run by Dawood Ibrahim and his men, will be immensely helpful in buying out dissenters and fence sitters in the theatre of the absurd that the Pakistani President intends to stage in the next six months.

Equally helpful will be demagogues like Lashkar chief Sayeed and Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam chief Maulana Fazlur Rehman. Barely two months ago, both of them were arrested, amidst a media blitzkrieg, for their involvement in religious extremism and terrorist violence. Both are today free men, thanks to President Musharraf's deliberate decision not to press charges of sedition and terrorism against them despite his loud claims to do so, before the western Press, during Operation Enduring Freedom. Clearly, India must not allow itself to be overtaken by events. It needs to launch a counter-offensive at the earliest. It must renew the demand for the extradition of Dawood Ibrahim and 19 other wanted terrorists with much greater force then hitherto, expose Pakistan's continued support to terror groups, and turn the diplomatic heat on Islamabad for supporting and sheltering Al Qaeda activists and terrorist group leaders like Sayeed. It must maintain a strict vigil in Kashmir-terrorists are now planning to exploit inflamed religious passions to spread their influence. Meanwhile, the situation in Gujarat must be controlled firmly. Otherwise, adverse public reaction in the United States' and other Western countries will undermine the diplomatic offensive that New Delhi has been waging against Pakistan since December 13.