What the Doctor Ordered Continues ……….

He would frequent only such mosques where Ahl-e-Hadees followers congregated. Occasionally, clergy from other parts of India would visit these mosques and give fiery and provocative speeches on alleged atrocities committed against Muslims in Kashmir.

Prominent amongst such speakers was Azam Ghauri, an Islamist from Karimnagar in Andhra Pradesh. He was a brilliant orator who had links with Naxalites and LeT. He had received extensive training in subversive activities in Pakistan and Afghanistan and was wanted for several crimes in Andhra Pradesh, including the murder of a senior police officer in Hyderabad. Dr Ansari struck up a friendship with Ghauri and was deeply
influenced by his radical views on seeking revenge on the Government of India and the majority community.

During one of his visits to the Mominpura mosque in 1986–87, one Abdul Karim aka Tunda (a moniker given in some parts of north India to anyone with only one arm) accompanied Ghauri.

An experienced and determined agent provocateur working for Pakistan’s ISI, Tunda had plans to carry out terror attacks in and around Mumbai. He soon realized that Dr Ansari was the right person to collaborate with in this mission.

But before we continue with the story of their partnership, a word or two about Tunda. Born in an impoverished family in Delhi in 1943, he moved to his native village Pilakhuwa in the Ghaziabad district of Uttar Pradesh to study at a madrasa.

From an early age he showed signs of religious fanaticism. In the wake of the Ram Janmabhoomi movement in India, he began his search for answers to the question why Muslims in India were doomed to be passive victims in the face of oppression by the majority community.

In 1985, he was a witness to serious communal riots in his native village when he saw his relatives being burnt alive by mobs. Several Muslim-run shops and a mosque were targeted by the rampaging marauders. These events turned him into a rabid fundamentalist and easy prey for the ISI.

To be Continued ………….