How ‘white-collar terrorism’ is not a new phenomenon

After the Delhi Red Fort blast, orchestrated by a ring of radicalised doctors working for Jaish-e-Mohammad and Ansar-Ghazwat-ul-Hind, the fancy jargon of ‘white-collar terrorism’ has become a fashionable word in the mainstream media, prime-time shows and YouTube podcasts. However, ‘white-collar terrorism’ is not as new as it is made out to be.

Internationally, terrorist veterans like Osama Bin Laden and Ayman Al Zawahiri were also highly educated individuals. The perpetrators of September 11 and many Isis cadres are highly educated and technology experts. The entire group of Isis recruits from Kerala came from well-to-do upper-middle-class Muslim families with a sound educational background. Even the terrorist masterminds of the Easter Sunday attack came from the wealthiest Muslim families of Sri Lanka. It has always been there in Kashmir.

The early crop of Kashmiri terrorists, mainly the members of the National Liberation Front (NLF)-Jammu Kashmir Liberation Front (JKLF), were not illiterate youngsters from rural areas. Terrorist commanders like Amanullah Khan, the HAJY Quartet (Hamid Sheikh, Ashfaq Majid Wani, the first Commander-in-Chief of JKLF, Javed Mir, and Yasin Malik), Maqbool Bhatt, and Hashim Qureshi were all educated, English-speaking youths from urban backgrounds. These terrorist commanders copied the tactics of Palestinian terrorists, initially claiming to lead a secular struggle for Kashmir’s independence; however, they were deeply inspired by Pan-Islamism.

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Syed Salahuddin, also known as Yusuf Shah, the chief commander of Hizbul Mujahideen, holds a master’s degree in political science from the University of Kashmir. He composed poetry in English. Omar Sheikh Saed, the Jaish terrorist released with Masood Azhar, who later killed Wall Street journalist Daniel Pearl, was an English-speaking British Pakistani with an LSE educational background. Masood Azhar, himself, is a highly qualified Islamic scholar, revered in Pakistan’s Islamic and jihadist circles for his religious scholarship.

The University of Kashmir has long been a centre for separatist ideology. Many prominent leaders of Kashmiri separatism and media personalities with Islamist and anti-India leanings hailed from the classrooms of the University of Kashmir. Jamaat-e-Islami has a strong hold in the colleges and the University of Kashmir. Reportedly, lecturers are appointed, transferred, and promoted on the recommendations of Jamaat-e-Islami.

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In my books titled Radicalisation in India: An Exploration and Terror Financing in Kashmir, I have discussed at length how schools, colleges and universities in J&K have become hotbeds of radicalisation. In Kashmir University, over the last two decades, the students have gone through massive Islamist influences. Back in the 1990s, the burqa was a rare sight; however, today it is a prominent feature at the University of Kashmir. In classroom discussions of master’s classes, religious issues are discussed and accorded supremacy over secular laws.

Burhan Wani, the poster boy of Kashmir militancy, was an engineer. Following his encounter with death, many educated middle-class youths joined militancy. His brother, Mannan Wani, who joined Hizbul Mujahedin, was a PhD candidate at Aligarh Muslim University. In May 2018, a sociology professor at the University of Kashmir, Mohammad Rafi Bhatt, joined Hizbul Mujaheedin and was killed in an encounter with Special Forces (SFs). His students informed me that in his classes, he mentioned that the Quran, Hadith and Sunnah offer better theories on sociology and other secular sciences, and the theoretical frameworks enunciated by the so-called secular and modern social and political scientists were rooted in Islam.

Zakir Musa, the celebrity terrorist who inspired the Kashmiri children and youth as a hero and formed Al Qaeda’s local affiliate Ansar Ghazwat-ul-Hind, was a product of Navodaya Vidyalaya. According to his classmates and school friends, he was a quiet and intellectual man with a strong appetite for books; however, his religious extremism was more than evident even in his routine behaviour.

The unravelling of the ring of radicalised doctors has shocked lay observers. However, my informed interlocutors from Kashmir suggest that the radicalisation of doctors has been going on for a long time. Every year, many Kashmiris travel to Pakistan to pursue studies in engineering and medical sciences.

This ISI-sponsored programme began with Pakistan; however, Pakistan started sending these Kashmiri students to other countries also, such as Bangladesh, Turkey, and the countries of Central Asia and Europe. The Indian students studying in Bangladeshi academic institutions are also exposed to intense radicalisation by the Jamaat-e-Islami. Through this study programme, the ISI generates funds that go into terror financing, as discussed in detail in my book, Terror Financing in Kashmir.

However, the most critical aspect of this scheme is the indoctrination and training of these students and Jihadist cadres that can be deployed in the cyber domain, media, and think tanks as Over Ground Workers (OGWs) in Kashmir to facilitate the work of terrorists, and now as terrorists on the ground for more complex operations requiring deft handling of advanced explosives, which only educated Jihadis with technical expertise can handle. Between 2016 and 2019, many such students were also given a 20-day course in handling weapons and explosives. Additionally, these students also work as couriers and coordinators in terror funding operations.

After the abrogation of Article 370, Pakistan was compelled to bring massive tactical changes to Kashmir. The NIA’s tough stance against terror funding, radicalisation and OGWs led to a significant dent in Pakistan’s separatist and Islamist ecosystem in Kashmir. Most of the OGWs were arrested and subjected to intense interrogation and criminal proceedings. Additionally, many of these OGWs, working for more than a decade and a half, were already exposed and were also working with the Indian agencies as double agents. In any event of a terror attack, they were the first lot of usual suspects who were rounded up by the police and SFs.

Hence, Pakistan relieved all of them and recruited a new crop of OGWs, who were primarily educated individuals working as technical experts and professionals and living as white-collar citizens in society. They had no police records or criminal antecedents; hence, they could not be identified by the SFs. Being better educated, they were more skilled in dodging the Indian agencies. They worked as OGWs and, in many cases, as hybrid militants. As hybrid militants, they were assigned a particular task and a weapon. After executing that, they had to dispose of the firearm and resume their everyday life as honourable citizens of society.

The white-collar separatists and Islamists also work as journalists, activists, and public intellectuals. A large number of Kashmiri individuals are working with TRT World, Turkey’s official broadcasting channel. From Turkey, they coordinate anti-India propaganda campaigns, cyber-jihad, and sabotage operations. Reportedly, JI-affiliated Kashmiris from South Kashmir have travelled to Turkey. From Turkey, they visited Pakistan and obtained a Pakistani passport, on which they travelled to Bangladesh. In Bangladesh, they are actively aiding JI and an array of anti-India Islamist and terrorist groups. Allegedly, they were also involved in the recent Red Fort blast in Delhi.

Having traced the history of white-collar terrorism in Kashmir, the question arises why educated individuals fall prey to Jihadist ideology. While analysing this question, it is pertinent to observe that in the human mind, reason and faith both exist as cognitive faculties. Even the educated ones, when they undergo emotional and psychological turmoil, often resort to faith.

The jihadist ideologues prey upon such vulnerabilities. One can find umpteen examples of highly educated girls who started taking Hijab after a heart-wrenching family tragedy or a bad break-up. More importantly, Islamist ideologues also offer an additional plan to indoctrinate an educated Muslim. They argue that Islam has alternative mechanisms to secular and democratic systems, and modern science has its roots in Islamic injunctions and teachings.

Further, they say that Sharia-sanctioned governance structures, judicial systems, social frameworks, and educational setups are far superior to secular, democratic, and modern social and political institutions. Islamist organisations like JI and the Muslim Brotherhood have a targeted focus on educational institutions where they target argumentative, vulnerable, and impressionable minds. Additionally, online exposure to extremist content and Islamism-infused geopolitical conflicts of West Asia also contributes significantly to the indoctrination of educated Muslims.

Finally, India must be prepared for more of such white-collar networks. As mentioned earlier, it has always existed in India, particularly in Kashmir. With this robust history of educated intellectuals leading the Islamist movements, it is entering into its next phase, ie, the transition from the role of intellectuals as OGWs and facilitators to direct participation in the acts of terror, which indeed will produce a range of challenges for Indian agencies. Dealing with this highly trained and professional generation of jihadis will require massive effort and an internal overhaul of the agencies.

Further, the menace of Islamist terrorism and extremism is not confined to Kashmir alone. It is fast spreading in the Indian hinterland. The ongoing communal polarisation and radicalisation are fast bringing the educated Muslim youth into the extremist ambit. However, it can go further and rope in a large number of illiterate Muslim masses confined to semi-skilled jobs.

Given the size of the Muslim population, even if this extremism impacts a minuscule percentage of them, it can lead to grave internal security challenges for India. It is high time for the government to seriously investigate this threat and develop a comprehensive, long-term roadmap to address this challenge.

(The author is a Cornell University graduate in public affairs, bachelors from St Stephen’s College, Delhi and has done his PhD on Jaish-e-Mohammad. He is a policy analyst specialising in counterterrorism, Indian foreign policy and Afghanistan-Pakistan geopolitics. Views expressed in the above piece are personal and solely those of the author. They do not necessarily reflect Firstpost’s views.)