Operation Mahadev | Dead terrorists tell no tales

A pattern of post-attack ‘encounters’ raises serious questions about the credibility, accountability, and timing of India's counterterrorism narrative

Would a group of terrorists on the run from Indian security forces for over three months still be carrying the weapons they used, their Pakistani voter ID cards, and branded Pakistani chocolates?

It was a remarkable coincidence that the ‘mastermind’ of the Pahalgam terror attack was killed on the very day that the much-awaited debate on Operation Sindoor — India’s retributory strike to punish the facilitators of the Pahalgam terrorist strike — was taking place.

Union Home Minister Amit Shah claimed that the mastermind of the Pahalgam strike, and another Pahalgam accused, were killed in what was dubbed ‘Operation Mahadev’ on July 29. He provided extensive ‘evidence’ to claim that Suleiman Shah indeed was the person responsible for planning and executing the April 22 attack. It was also claimed that one Jibran, killed with Suleiman Shah, had been responsible for the 2024 Sonmarg Tunnel attack.

Are the Indian people and their parliament expected to believe this shaggy-dog story?

The frequency with which Indian security forces gather intelligence, launch fancily named operations and kill ‘masterminds’ — after the event — is by now legendary.

Conveniently, Shah said he had been asked by the families of those killed in the terror attack that they be shot in the head, “coincidentally, during the encounter, they were indeed shot in the head”. Capturing them alive might have led to some revelations about the planning and execution of the attack. Now no one will be any wiser, and whatever the government’s polemics in Parliament choose to reveal will have to be taken at face value.

Doubts arise about the government’s claims not only because of the sharp political polarisation in India today. It is also because such after-the-event encounters have become a pattern.

After the 2019 Uri attack, Indian security forces claimed to have eliminated its ‘planners’ in subsequent cross-border operations and local encounters. All the ‘masterminds’ of the Pulwama terror strike were also killed subsequently.

However, till today, there is no information in the public domain about who has been punished for the massive intelligence failure in 2019, or who allowed 300 kg of explosives (including 80 kg of RDX) to be gathered and moved to Pulwama in which 40 CRPF jawans lost their lives.

Mohammad Ismal Alvi alias Lamboo alias Saifullah, described as a key planner of the Pulwama attack, was killed in an encounter in Dachigam in 2021. Kamran alias Ghazi Rasheed, a ‘mastermind’ of the Pulwama attack and who allegedly ‘trained suicide bomber’ Adil Ahmad Dar was killed in an encounter in Pinglan in February 2019. Mudasir Ahmad Khan, ‘local recruiter and logistics coordinator’ was killed in Tral in 2019 (he was also reported to have been killed six years later, once again in Operation Sindoor!). Qari Yasir, again a JeM commander ‘involved in operational planning’ and Sajjad Bhat, who provided the vehicle used in the bombing, were all killed in encounters in 2019. Sameer Dhar, local JeM operative ‘linked to logistics’ was killed in 2021.

And the final clincher — Yusuf Azhar, a senior JeM figure linked to the IC814 hijacking and Abdul Malik Rauf, Lashkar-e-Toiba commander, who were linked to Pulwama, were both apparently killed during Operation Sindoor this year.

If they are all dead, where is the independent verification of their roles?

There is no independent forensic verification of the government claims of evidence that ballistics tests matched the rifles recovered from the terrorists and the shell casings recovered at the Pahalgam site. The bodies of the terrorists have apparently been identified by villagers who had sheltered them but not by the families of the victims who saw them execute their loved ones.

Perhaps this is the shortfall in verification that former Jammu and Kashmir chief minister Farooq Abdullah hinted at, when he responded to the news remarking: “Only those who have seen them (the terrorists), can identify them.”

Given the political timing of the incident, how does one know that the evidence was not planted? It is a common enough strategy in the subcontinent — a popular TV serial, for example, showed a police inspector entering someone’s house and ordering his deputy, “Havildar, aslaa baramad karo (Havildar, show recovery of weapons)!”

If the Pahalgam terrorists were such badly trained recruits who kept items of identification on them and did not follow the standard protocol to avoid traceable items, then should Suleiman Shah be dubbed a ‘mastermind’ or a prize idiot?

These announcements tend to coincide, or appear deliberately timed, with parliamentary debates, times of extraordinary India-Pakistan tension, prominent diplomatic visits, and when the government seems to be on the backfoot. Such claims allow those in power to successfully resolve the issue to their strategic advantage.

Public verification is virtually impossible — the forensic reports, the intercepted messages, and intelligence inputs cannot be and are never released in the public domain. The Opposition is far too scared of being dubbed anti-national, pro-Pakistan, or pro-terrorist. So, they do not question how the security forces determined who was a mastermind, a key planner, logistics expert, suicide bomber trainer, or a commander, whatever that term might mean for a ragtag group. As it is, former Home Minister P Chidambaram has been derided and trolled for even suggesting that the terrorists might have been local Kashmiris. He later claimed he had been quoted out of context.

Nor can we hope for judicial oversight where the arrested are subject to trial or cross-examination to establish who controlled and directed them. Dead men tell no tales.

The media also does not play its role in the independent scrutiny of internal or external security issues. Perhaps it fears that by falling foul of the government, it will lose access to the government and even ad-revenue.

At best, what the government has achieved by its statements is control over the political narrative. The retributive killings will provide closure not only to a traumatised public, but also immunity to those who would have been held accountable and ought to have been sacked for security and intelligence failure. Instead, it allows them to preen themselves like lions on the prowl, growling at all and sundry.

But the citizens remain uninformed. As national strategic goals become increasingly opaque and inaccessible, there can be no public debate on the future of security doctrines or posing of alternatives that do not put India constantly on the edge of war.

Bharat Bhushan is a New Delhi-based journalist.

Disclaimer: The views expressed above are the author's own. They do not necessarily reflect the views of DH.