Militant ranks swell under Gen’s nose

‘‘The young jehadis come from poor and middle-class families. When they fail to find any employment, they join the jehadi outfits that provide them food and shelter and promise them a passage to paradise,’’ says peace activist Gulzar Ahmad. This is corroborated by unofficial profiles of jehadis. A vast majority of youth that joins the radical Islamists consists of runaway boys. At least 60 per cent of them are school dropouts.

Naveed Ahmed of Jhelum in north Punjab was one of them. His father was a clerk in a private company with a monthly salary of Rs 7,000. When Naveed failed the 10th grade exam, his parents berated him. This prompted him to join the outlawed Al-Badar Mujahideen. He was trained in a camp and sent to fight the Indian Army — he was killed in the very first encounter. His body was retrieved and handed over to his parents with a videotaped message he had recorded before his death.

Following General Musharraf’s January 12, 2002 speech, the government of Pakistan had banned all jehadi outfits but most have re-emerged under new names. The firebrand chief of LeT, Hafiz Mohammad Saeed, says Lashkar is banned in Pakistan, not in PoK. ‘‘We reject Musharraf’s peace initiative with India; jehad will strengthen the Kashmir cause,’’ Saeed told his followers in Lahore last week. Similarly, JeM’s chief Maulana Azhar Masood has publicly said that Jaish can’t be stopped from operating in PoK.

In fact, these outfits have stepped up their campaign to recruit more volunteers in the wake of US attacks on Afghanistan and Iraq. They are effectively using publications, websites, leaders at local prayers, audio-video cassettes, CDs, file covers, badges, T-shirts, etc for spreading their message.

Claims Maulana Yousaf, a prayer leader at Al-Raza Mosque in Rawalpindi: ‘‘My speeches have motivated hundreds of people to donate their sons.’’ Ahsan Mehmood has eight children. He works as a labourer in Rawalpindi and earns barely 150 rupees a day. Last month, he donated his two sons. ‘‘It is better for them to die for a cause…before hunger kills them,’’ is his argument.

‘‘The jehadi outfits have offices in Islamabad and Rawalpindi. They chase young boys and indoctrinate them. They draw a very rosy picture of jehad. They tell innocent boys that they will go to paradise and get 70 houris if they died in Allah’s way. That’s what they did to my son,’’ recalls Maula Bux, father of Kalim, who was killed in Kashmir in March this year.

Sakina, mother of 23-year-old Imran who was killed in Kashmir in June, has a similar story. ‘‘They tempted my son with all the talk about martyrdom and salvation. He was unemployed and quite frustrated and perhaps found it easier to live in the hereafter than here and now,’’ she says.

Of course, the most steady stream of warriors comes from the seminaries run by various outfits. Here they are indoctrinated over a longer period of time since they join at a much younger age, points out Anis Jillani, head of the Society for Protection of Children’s Rights.

An interior ministry official says the government cannot penalise people for donating their children or stop the youth from joining these outfits. ‘‘This happens secretly. They do not have any official patronage. You cannot stop jehad. If you have to stop it, you will have to stop people from offering prayers and keeping fasts. In other words, jehad is an integral part of Islam, so you can’t reject it,’’ he said.

‘‘The govt is monitoring the activities of these jehadi groups and will take stern action if it got any proof or substantial evidence. But we cannot proceed against them without any evidence. The government also can’t ban them unless they are really involved in anti-state activities,’’ says Interior Minister Faisal Saleh Hayat. (The Friday Times)