NEW DELHI, May 8: Abdul Rauf Azhar, brother of UN-designated terrorist Masood Azhar and the operational head of Jaish-e-Mohammed, the mastermind of IC-814 hijacking, was killed in the “Operation Sindoor” attack on the JeM headquarter at Bahawalpur, official sources said on Thursday.
It is considered to be one of the massive achievements of “Operation Sindoor.” In the Punjab province of Pakistan, the Indian armed forces carried out strike in Bahawalpur and Muridke, destroying the headquarters of Jaish and Lashkar-e-Toiba, the two terror outfits that have spilled Indian blood and inflicted injuries upon India for several years.
“Among those reported eliminated is Abdul Rauf Azhar — operational head of Jaish-e-Mohammad, mastermind of the IC-814 hijacking, and a central figure in international jihadist networks,” the officials said.
Ten family members of Masood Azhar, including his sister and brother-in-law were killed in Bahawalpur strike. The Jaish terrorist released a statement confirming their elimination. “Rauf Azhar’s role in orchestrating the IC-814 hijacking directly facilitated the release of Omar Saeed Sheikh, a key Al-Qaeda operative who went on to kidnap and murder Daniel Pearl, an American-Jewish journalist with the Wall Street Journal. Pearl’s brutal execution in 2002 shocked the conscience of the world and remains a defining example of the global threat posed by state-protected terror networks,” officials said.
Abdul Rauf Azhar was among those who hijacked the Indian Airlines plane IC-814 in December 1999 when en route from Kathmandu to Delhi. The flight was hijacked by five terrorists of the Harkat-ul-Mujahideen and taken to Taliban-controlled Kandahar in Afghanistan. Masood Azhar had to be released as part of the swap of passengers on the aircraft.
After his release, Masood Azhar founded JeM, which later carried out several attacks on Indian soil, including the 2001 Parliament attack and, 2016 Uri attack. Despite a ban in Pakistan after the 2001 attack, Jaish continues to operate in the country.
The BJP also put out a social media post with Abdul Rauf Azhar’s photo and “eliminated” written on it. Besides hijacking of IC-814, Abdul Rauf Azhar, a most-wanted terrorist, was also involved in the Pathankot terror attack and the 2001 attack on Parliament.
In the IC 814 hijack, an India Airlines plane flying from Kathmandu to Delhi with 190 people on board, was diverted to Kandahar and the Indian government was forced to release three terrorists in exchange for the release of the passengers — one of them was Masood Azhar.
(Manas Dasgupta)
