Mosque storming D-day was Feb 10

But the plan, backed by all the three intelligence agencies, was blocked at the last moment as it had missed the most fundamental point—the rescue and safety of a large number of female students in the mosque complex. At that time, the complex had 4,000 to 6,000 female students.

In fact, Musharraf was tipped off about this by one his presidential aides who requested for a high-level meeting to ponder over the issue, the official said.

“One of the participants in the meeting also pointed out that the plan didn’t provide for the rescue and safety of thousands of girls and children inside Lal Masjid-Jamia Hafsa, (the girls’ madrasa) and when the President, too, put the same question to Kamal Shah, he had no answer.”

The plan was then put on hold and all agreed to do proper homework before carrying out the operation. “The President emphasised that the main consideration must be to minimise human loss,” the official said.

One of the four major decisions taken in the meeting was to neutralise the capital’s 18 militant madrasas which closely work in coordination with the Lal Masjid-Jamia Hafsa, he said.

“We did that successfully and used even money where it was required to achieve our objective,” the official said.

“It was because of this that none of these seminaries came out on streets in support of the Lal Masjid-Jamia Hafsa when the compound was struck,” he added.

The other decisions were to penetrate a few ‘Jihadis’ in the masjid brigade so as to continuously get the true picture, let the complex open to the media in a bid to garner public support and persuade the radicals in the mosque to change their minds, he said.