Most Wanted Islamic Terrorists of India

Most wanted names of terror world
Agencies
New Delhi, April 03, 2012

Hafiz Mohammad Saeed, the man blamed for organising the 2008 terror attacks in Mumbai, may have to think twice before he brazenly moves around in Pakistan and delivers hate speeches against America and India. The United States has offered a $10 million reward for the militant leader who makes frequent public appearances in Pakistan.

Under a scheme called Rewards for Justice, the United States pays out bounties for information leading to the arrest and conviction of a named suspect. American bounties have helped in breaking the ranks of terrorist organisations and led to the capture of terror leaders. India, too, has its list of most wanted terrorists.

Dawood Ibrahim

The don of Mumbai and India’s most wanted man. Dawood, and his brother Anis, allegedly masterminded India’s worst bombings, which killed at least 250 people and wounded more than 700 in Mumbai in 1993. The son of a police constable, Dawood runs a billion-dollar vice empire spanning gambling, drugs and prostitution. In October 2003, the United States designated Dawood as a global terrorist with links to Islamist militant groups al Qaeda and Lashkar-e-Taiba. His daughter is married to the son of legendary Pakistani cricketer Javed Miandad. Dawood has not been seen in public for years–Indian authorities don’t even have a recent photograph of him–but he still runs his criminal empire.

Illyas Kashmiri

Kashmiri, labeled a “specially designated global terrorist” by the US, is suspected to have played a key role in training and arming the terrorists who attacked Mumbai in 2008. Kashmiri, an al-Qaeda member, was indicted in a US court in Chicago with American David Headley for allegedly plotting to attack a Danish newspaper that had published cartoons of the Prophet Mohammed. Headley pleaded guilty over that plot and to scouting targets in the 2008 Mumbai attacks. Kashmiri was reported killed in a US drone strike in northwestern Pakistan in June 2011.

Syed Salahuddin

He is commander of the Hizbul-Mujahideen, the biggest Kashmiri terrorist group and at the forefront of the terror campaign in Kashmir. He claims that he turned to militancy after he lost an election for the Kashmir legislative assembly in 1987, which he alleges was “massively rigged” by India. He lives in Muzaffarabad in Pakistan-occupied Kashmir and regularly lashes out against peace talks between New Delhi and Islamabad. The Hizbul has been crushed in Kashmir, and Salahuddin himself admitted this week that his group had beat a “tactical retreat”.

Maulana Masood Azhar

He came into the international spotlight in December 1999 when India was forced to free him from jail along with two other militants, in exchange for the release of crew and passengers of an Indian Airlines plane that had been hijacked from Kathmandu in Nepal and taken to Kandahar in Afghanistan. He became a leader of the Pakistani militant group Harkat-ul-Mujahideen. In 1994 he was captured in Kashmir, and tried for terrorism. He spent six years in jail until he was sprung by the hijacking. Azhar formed Jaish-e-Mohammad in 2000 after returning to Pakistan. Jaish was banned by Pakistan, along with Lashkar-e-Taiba-and several other groups in 2002, and Azhar was put under house arrest, only to be freed by a Lahore court 10 months later.

Memon brothers, Ibrahim and Yakub

The Mumbai gangsters are accused of organising the 1993 Mumbai bomb blasts case. The brothers and their families are now believed to be in hiding in Pakistan. Ibrahim, aka Tiger Memon, was reported to be in Karachi in 2003. Black Friday, the movie based on journalist S Hussain Zaidi’s book, gives a glimpse into how the brothers carried out the 1993 blasts.