 "Taliban Islamic militia commandos head towards the hijacked Indian Airlines plane at Kandahar airport in Afghanistan, December 30, 1999. File Photo/AFP")
Netflix’s series on the alarming hijacking of an Indian flight has released today (August 29). IC 814: The Kandahar Hijack delves into the hijacking of the Indian Airlines flight IC 814 in December 1999.
The show focuses on one of the worst crises in India’s aviation history. While the Indian government faced flak over its decision to free terrorists in exchange for hostages, the incident brought out the country’s diplomatic prowess.
Let’s turn the pages of history to know what happened in December 1999.
The hijacking of IC-814
On December 24, 1999, five masked terrorists hijacked Indian Airlines flight IC 814, about 40 minutes after it took off from the Tribhuvan International Airport in Kathmandu, en route to Delhi’s Indira Gandhi International Airport.
Captain Devi Sharan, the pilot on board, was forced to fly the hijacked plane to Lahore. However, Pakistan denied permission for the flight, which was carrying 180 passengers including the crew, to land.
The plane, running low on fuel, was then diverted to Amritsar for refuelling. The hijacked flight landed in Amritsar and there are claims that the Indian government did not act fast to stop it from leaving Indian soil.
The Indian authorities tried to delay the flight while the National Security Guard (NSG) commandos were flown in from Delhi. However, the hijackers grew suspicious of the time it was taking for refuelling and threatened to kill hostages if the pilot did not take off.
Impact Shorts
More ShortsAs per ThePrint, the NSG commandos reached Amritsar an hour after the hijacked flight had left.
The aircraft flew to Lahore, Pakistan authorities initially tried to prevent its landing but gave the nod later. Pakistan had agreed to refuel the flight on the condition that it would leave its airspace immediately.
After refuelling, the plane was taken to Dubai. India got in touch with the United States, which pressured the United Arab Emirates (UAE) government to allow the aircraft to land in Dubai, reported ThePrint.
At the Al Minhad Air Base in the UAE, the terrorists released 27 passengers, including the body of 25-year-old Rupin Katyal, who was fatally stabbed by Zahoor Mistry, one of the hijackers on the plane.
The hijacked flight was then taken to Kandahar in Afghanistan, which was ruled by the Taliban.
The diplomatic challenge
The then-Atal Bihari Vajpayee government was in a fix. India had to engage with the Taliban government, which it did not recognise.
A senior Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) official told India Today in 2000, “For us, it was one of the most difficult assignments in recent times. We were expected to develop a rapport with the Taliban with whom we hardly had any communication, leave alone relationship.”
The five hijackers, who belonged to the Pakistan-based terror group Harkat-ul-Mujahideen (HuM), demanded the release of 36 terrorists in exchange for the hostages. They also wanted a ransom of $200 million.
But India was ready to release five terrorists, none of whom would be an Indian national, as per the India Today report.
The hijackers did not budge.
On 26 December, PM Vajpayee had told reporters: “My government will not bend before such a terror.” However, pressure was increasing on the government from the families of the hostages as each day passed.
The Taliban, hungry for international recognition, agreed to mediate between the hijackers and the Indian government.
The Islamic fundamentalist militia regime has been accused of replenishing the arsenal of the hijackers when the flight was in Kandahar, reported India Today.
According to ThePrint, the Taliban convinced the hijackers to drop the ransom demand and agree to the release of three militants.
The hijackers called for the release of Ahmed Omar Saeed Sheikh and Maulana Masood Azhar , both members of HuM, and Kashmiri terrorist Mushtaq Ahmed Zargar.
Azhar’s brothers Rauf Asghar and Ibrahim Azhar were among those who hijacked the flight.
Amid intense pressure and internal wrangling, the Vajpayee government concurred to release these three terrorists from Indian prisons. The then foreign minister Jaswant Singh took a flight to Afghanistan on the evening of December 30, with these militants on board to barter them for the hostages.
“I must have slept around 3 am. I woke up at 8 am. The usual Afghan bread was served for breakfast. I did not feel like eating. I was worried that the millennium would end in hours and I would be missing the celebrations. I was thinking of many things,” merchant navy captain Kollattu Ravikumar, who was one of the hostages, recalled.
India has faced flak for releasing the three terrorists as part of the Kandahar deal. The BJP government has been criticised for not resolving the crisis sooner, especially allowing the hijacked flight to leave the Indian airspace.
National Security Advisor (NSA) Ajit Doval, the then Intelligence Bureau chief who oversaw the handover and release of passengers, had reportedly called it a “diplomatic failure” and a “bloody disgrace” for India.
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What happened to the terrorists?
As per Independent, India assumed the Taliban officials would arrest the hijackers and detain the released terrorists. However, the Taliban provided them a safe passage to Pakistan.
Masood Azhar, under the protection of Pakistan’s spy agency Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI), went on to lay the foundation of the notorious terror outfit, the Jaish-e-Mohammed.
Jaish has carried out several attacks on Indian soil killing hundreds, including the dastardly Parliament attacks in 2001, the 2016 attacks on the Indian Air Force base in Pathankot, and the 2019 Pulwama attack.
The released terrorists have also been implicated in the 2008 Mumbai terror attacks and the kidnapping and murder of The Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl in 2002.
With inputs from agencies