South Asia Terrorism Portal

Changing Face of Terror
Ajit Kumar Singh
Research Fellow, Institute for Conflict Management

On April 21, 2019, South Asia witnessed the worst ever terror attack, in terms of fatalities, recorded in the region till date. On Easter Sunday (April 21), Islamist terrorists carried out eight coordinated suicide bomb attacks within a span of six hours (8:45am to 2:45am, SST). The attacks which targeted three Churches and three major hotels across the three main cities – Colombo, Negombo and Batticaloa - of Sri Lanka, resulted in fatalities of at least 253 persons, including 250 civilians and three Security Force (SF) personnel. Nine suicide bombers involved in the attacks were also killed, taking the total death toll in the incident to 262. Another 500 persons were injured, including many severely.

Incidents in Sri Lanka after the April 21 attack, prominently, the raid by Sri Lankan SFs’ in Ampara District on April 26-27, 2019, which resulted in the death of 15 persons, mostly terror suspects who were part of the larger module involved in the April 21 attacks, and their family members, clearly indicate that the present threat is far from over.

Preliminary investigations indicate that two little known Sri Lanka-based Islamist terror formations, the National Thawheed Jamaath and Jammiyathul Millathu Ibrahim in collusion with the global terrorist formation, Islamic State (IS, also Daesh), carried out the attacks.

The previous worst attack in the region was recorded on March 12, 1993, in Mumbai (Maharashtra) in India, when the city was rocked by a series of bomb explosions within a span of two and a half hours (1:30pm to 4:00pm, IST) which had resulted in death of 253 persons. At least 713 persons had sustained injuries in the attack. The Mumbai attacks were masterminded by Dawood Ibrahim, whose D-Company has now established close associations with the Islamist terrorist formations operating out of Pakistan. Dawood Ibrahim is globally one of the most wanted terrorists.

South Asia has for long faced Islamist terrorism and, since 2005, according to partial data compiled by the South Asia Terrorism Portal (SATP), the region has accounted for at least 71,400 Islamist terrorism-linked fatalities: 24,766 civilians; 8,218 SF personnel; 38,416 militants (data till April 28, 2019). [The data does not include fatalities in Afghanistan as the SATP database on Afghanistan only commences January 1, 2018]. Pakistan accounted for 62,535 such fatalities, followed by India (7,828), Bangladesh (760) and Sri Lanka (277).

1,156 of these fatalities were recorded in 2018 down from 1,683 in 2017. There were a total of 560 such fatalities in 2019. Fatalities in this category have been declining since 2010.

Nevertheless, the attacks in Sri Lanka, and developments in recent pasts in Pakistan, Bangladesh, India, and the Maldives, demonstrate that threats from this form of terrorism remain as alive, and have the potential to gain significant momentum at any juncture in these countries if there is any slackness on the part of the Government in the policy making and the SFs on ground. The April 21 attacks in Sri Lanka underline the dangers of complacency, as there was ample actionable intelligence  available with authorities, but the intelligence and enforcement apparatus failed to act.

Left-Wing Extremism (LWE), which has also afflicted wide areas in the region, has also been on a decline. According to the SATP database, since 2005, the region has accounted for at least 11,654 LWE-linked fatalities (3,757 civilians, 2,532 SF personnel, 5,365 militants, data till April 28, 2019). India accounted for 8,260 such fatalities, followed by Nepal 2,623 Bangladesh 758 and Bhutan, 13.

418 Maoist fatalities were recorded in 2018 up from 348 in 2017. There have already been 102 such fatalities in 2019. Though fatalities in this category have maintained a cyclical trend since 2010 it has never crossed three digits thereafter. There were a total of 1,268 LWE-linked fatalities in 2010.  Significantly, the two decade-long Maoist insurgency in Nepal ended with a peace agreement in 2006, removing one of the principal theatres of LWE violence from the conflict map.

In Bangladesh, mounting SF pressure has forced LWEs to stop their violent activities. Indeed, the last incident of killing by LWEs was recorded on December 9, 2013, when suspected LWEs killed a local trader in the Santhia sub-District of Pabna District.

Developments in India, nevertheless, demonstrate that the residual potential of LWE groups is significant.  In India, the intermittent and audacious attacks of the recent past clearly indicate that the Maoists still possess the wherewithal, albeit diminishing, to strike at will. Even as the general elections are underway in the country, cadres of the Communist Party of India–Maoist (CPI-Maoist) triggered an Improvised Explosive Device (IED) blast and subsequently opened fire, targeting the convoy of a Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) Member of the Legislative Assembly (MLA), Bhima Mandavi, in a forested patch near Nakulnar village under the Kuwakonda tehsil (revenue unit) of Dantewada District in Chhattisgarh’s ailing Bastar Division, on April 9, 2019. Those killed included MLA Mandavi and his three Personal Security Officers (PSOs), as well as the constable-driver.

Total terrorism and insurgency linked fatalities in South Asia (including Islamist and LWE) have dropped from a peak of 29,638 (of which 15,565 were in Sri Lanka alone) in 2009, to just 1,648 in 2018, the lowest fatalities recorded in a year since 2005. There were 2,145 fatalities in 2017. Such fatalities have been in continuous decline since 2010.

At least 614 fatalities [excluding fatalities recorded in Afghanistan], including 329 civilians, 120 SF personnel and 165 Insurgents/terrorists, have been documented across the region in the first quarter of 2019 (data till April 28, 2019). During the corresponding period in 2018, there were 501 such fatalities, including 136 civilians, 131 SF personnel and 243 Insurgents.

The spread of conflict has declined along with its intensity. The SATP Conflict Map for South Asia shows significant areas of the region affected by high intensity conflict (fatalities above 1000) in 2009, while there were no such regions remaining in 2018. By 2018, only two Districts (Mastung and Quetta), both in the Balochistan Province of Pakistan, remained afflicted by low intensity conflict (fatalities between 100 and 1000 per annum).  Another 134 districts were affected by ‘other conflict’ (less than 100 fatalities per annum), of which 83 were in India and 41 were in Pakistan.

However, the situation in Afghanistan remains dire. According to partial data compiled by SATP, 3,705 fatalities have already been recorded, including 124 civilians, 394 SF personnel and 3,182 insurgents, in 503 incidents of killing in 2019 (data till April 28). During the corresponding period in 2018, 5,345 fatalities, including 285 civilians, 252 SF personnel and 4,502 insurgents, were recorded in 705 incidents of killing. Through 2018, fatalities totaled 14,581, including 1,076 civilians, 1,526 SF personnel and 11,684 Insurgents, in 1,758 incidents of killing. 

Casualties among civilians, the best indicator of the prevailing security scenario in any theatre of conflict, have been rising in Afghanistan since 2014, with the exception of 2017. 2018 registered 3,804 fatalities among civilians, the highest ever recorded by the United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan UNAMA since 2009 [when UNAMA first began counting civilian fatalities]. The previous high of 3,701 civilian fatalities was recorded in 2014. Fatalities in the civilian category remained under 3,000 for four out of the five years between 2009 and 2013. Civilian fatalities stood at 3,133 in 2011.

Sustained improvement in the security situation across much of South Asia has helped the region grow. According to the latest available World Bank data, the region’s GDP (current USD) had risen to 3.34 trillion in 2017, as against 1.683 trillion in 2009, when fatalities were at peak. Similarly, Gross National Income (GNI) per capita, at USD 1063.85 in 2009, increased to USD 1723.92 in 2017. Life expectancy increased from 64.3 in 2009 to 68.95 in 2017.

Nevertheless, South Asia remains among the most violent region globally. According to the Global Terrorism Index (GTI) 2018,

More worryingly, the GTI 2018 confirmed,

According to The Soufan Center’s report in 2017, 75 persons from India, 650 persons from Pakistan and 32 persons from Sri Lanka had joined fighting alongside the Islamic State. Specifically, according to the SATP database, a total of 168 Daesh sympathizers/recruits have been arrested and another 74 persons have been detained, counselled and released, in India (data till April 28, 2019), while 98 Indians were believed to have travelled to Syria, Iraq and Afghanistan to join IS – microscopic numbers in terms of the country's huge Muslim population. Of the 98 who travelled abroad to join Daesh, 33 are confirmed to have been killed. Further, according to an ICSR report on Women and Minors of Islamic State published in July 2018, at least 200 persons from Maldives and 40 persons from Bangladesh were also among Daesh’s foreign fighters.

Daesh’s involvement in the latest suicide bombings and subsequent incidents in Sri Lanka are a warning to all states across the region. Indeed, the perpetrator groups in Sri Lanka are also believed to have linkages in India. The degree to which the evolution of the National Thawheed Jamaath and the Jamiyathul Milathu Ibrahim (both groups were banned by Sri Lankan Government on April 27, 2019) was hidden away from intelligence and enforcement agencies in Sri Lanka is an index of the potential that could well be developing, or that could develop, in other countries of the region as well. Despite tremendous gains across major theatres of violence across South Asia, states and their agencies need to be far more vigilant, responsive and prepared to meet potentially escalating threats in the near future.

Punjab: Sustained Subversion
Nijeesh N
Research Associate, Institute for Conflict Management

As in previous years, Pakistani efforts to create disturbances in the Indian State of Punjab in support of Khalistani separatism continued through 2018. Worryingly, Khalistani terrorists managed to inflict a major attack (resulting in three or more fatalities) in the State after an 11 year gap, with three persons killed and another 20 injured in a grenade attack at a religious congregation at the Nirankari Satsang Bhawan at Adliwal village in Amritsar District on November 8, 2018. The last such major attack was reported on October 14, 2007, when seven persons were killed and 40 were injured in a bomb blast inside a cinema hall in Ludhiana.

The Punjab Chief Minister Captain (Retd.) Amarinder Singh referring to the Satsang Bhavan blast stated on November 19, 2018, that the attack had Pakistan’s ‘signature’ as the grenade used (HG-84) in the attack was similar to the grenades manufactured by Pakistan’s Army Ordnance Factory. Indeed, Punjab Police subsequently arrested two members of the Khalistan Liberation Force (KLF), Bikramjit Singh (arrested on November 21, 2018) and Avtar Singh (November 24, 2018), for their involvement in the grenade attack and identified three other persons residing in foreign countries as accused (names not disclosed). The arrested persons disclosed that the grenade was provided by Pakistan-based KLF ‘chief’ Harmeet Singh Happy aka PhD.

Harmeet Singh had earlier masterminded the conspiracy to carry out a series of targeted killings in different parts of Punjab over 2016-2017, with the support of Pakistan’s military establishment and Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI). A total of nine persons, including some leaders of Hindu outfits, were killed over this period in ‘targeted attacks’ which the National Investigation Agency (NIA)’s investigation unveiled were planned and executed by a transnational network of conspirators, including Harmeet Singh.

Punjab recorded another attack on September 14, 2018, when four militants hurled four grenades at the Maqsudan Police Station in Jalandhar District, injuring two Police personnel. Investigation revealed that Jammu and Kashmir-based Ansar Ghazwat-ul-Hind, headed by Zakir Rashid Bhatt aka Zakir Musa, had carried out the attacks. Zakir Musa had also directed Kashmiri students to plant a grenade at the Chandigarh bus stand.

On December 26, 2018, the UMHA banned KLF and all its manifestations under the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act (UAPA). KLF was the 40^th entry in the list of terrorist organizations banned by the Government of India.

According to partial data compiled by the South Asia Terrorism Portal (SATP), in 2018 three civilian fatalities were recorded in Punjab, all in the November 8, 2018 attack. In 2017, apart from the targeted killings of six persons, Punjab had recorded two fatalities as the Border Security Force (BSF) shot dead two Pakistani infiltrators along the Indo-Pakistan border. During 2016, Punjab recorded 25 fatalities [four civilians (three targeted killings), seven Security Force (SF) personnel and 14 militants] which included the attack on the Indian Air Force (IAF) Base at Pathankot on January 2-3, 2016, by Islamist Terrorists of the Pakistan-based Jaish-e-Mohammed (JeM). 2015 also saw an Islamist terrorist attack at the Dinanagar Police Station  campus in the Gurdaspur District of Punjab in the early hours of July 27, 2015, in which 10 persons were killed (three civilians, four SF personnel and three terrorists). No fatalities were recorded in 2014 and 2013. Two infiltrators were killed along the Punjab border in 2012.

Significantly, the Minister of State in the Union Ministry of Home Affairs (UMHA), Hansraj Gangaram Ahir on January 2, 2019, informed the Rajya Sabha (Upper House of Indian Parliament) that a total of 18 Khalistani terrorist modules were neutralized, resulting in the arrest of 95 Khalistani operatives, during the preceding two years in Punjab.

Earlier on November 18, 2018, Chief Minister Amarinder Singh stated that at least 15 terrorist modules had been neutralized in the preceding 18 months, with indications of ‘Kashmiri terror’ links emerging in some instances as well, as evidenced in the case of the grenade attack at Maqsudan Police Station on September 14, 2018.

Partial data on the SATP database records at least 16 Khalistan militants arrested through 2018, in addition to 42 arrested in 2017. A total of 234 Khalistani terrorists principally associated with the Babbar Khalsa International (BKI), Khalistan Liberation Force (KLF), Bhindranwale Tigers Force of Khalistan (BTFK), Khalistan Zindabad Force (KZF), Khalistan Commando Force (KCF), International Sikh Youth Federation (ISYF) as well as some minor factions have been arrested since 2010 (data till April 28, 2019). At least seven of these militants have been arrested in the current year (data till April 28, 2019).

Most recently, on March 31, 2019, the State Special Operations Cell (SSOC) of the Punjab Police neutralized a terrorist module and arrested five ‘highly radicalised’ members of the Babbar Khalsa International (BKI) from a park near Dara Studio in the Phase 6 area of Sahibzada Ajit Singh Nagar in Mohali District. One .32 bore pistol along with a magazine and four live rounds, as well as 15 letter pads of BKI, were recovered from the possession of the arrested persons.

According to reports, the fives arrestees were part of a bigger module which also included three other militants, identified as Rupinder Singh, Daler Singh Bunty and Ranjit Singh, who are yet to be arrested. Ranjit Singh, former ‘chief’ of the Khalistan Tiger Force (KTF), is based in Germany, and was the mastermind providing help to the accused and motivating them to eliminate the targets. The arrested persons were also reportedly in touch with Jagtar Singh Hawara of BKI, currently lodged in Tihar jail in New Delhi.

According to Varinder Paul Singh, Assistant Inspector General (AIG) of SSOC, Mohali, the arrested persons were radicalised over social media by suspected persons based in Europe. The module was planning to kill specific targets in Punjab, including Hindu leaders and members of Dera Sacha Sauda. The accused wanted to kill certain people to fulfill the ‘incomplete’ task other militants who were lodged in different jails in Punjab and other States. The module was mobilising funds and had already procured lethal weapons. They were also planning to arrange weapons’ training in Jammu and Kashmir (J&K) and were in touch with leaders such as Ranjit Singh and Jagtar Singh Hawara in this regard.

Meanwhile, activities to keep Khalistani/Sikh separatism alive continued at the international level. Sikhs for Justice (SFJ), a marginal Khalistani diaspora group headquartered in the United States (US), organized an event on August 12, 2018, at Trafalgar Square in London and announced the ‘Khalistani Referendum 2020’ campaign. The ‘referendum’ purportedly aims to determine the wishes of the Sikh community settled across the globe on the issue of Punjab’s ‘liberation’ from India by 2020, and then pursue a referendum through the intervention of the United Nations (UN).

According to intelligence sources in August 2018, ISI, a secret operation code-named as ‘Express’ was funding and promoting the ‘Khalistani Referendum 2020’ campaign. Significantly, on November 23, 2018, when India’s Cabinet approved the decision on the construction of the Kartarpur corridor, Pakistan gave permission to the SFJ to open its office in Lahore. On November 28, 2018, the SFJ leadership even declared, ‘the Kartarpur corridor is a bridge to Khalistan’ and announced their intention to organise the Kartarpur Sahib Convention-2019 in support of the referendum agenda at Kartarpur Sahib in Pakistan, if the proposed corridor for Sikh pilgrims between India and Pakistan is functional by then. On April 14, 2019, however, the Pakistan Government disallowed foreign-based Khalistani Sikhs from commencing registration for ‘Referendum 2020’ in Pakistan.

On the Sikh festival of Baisakhi (April 14), the Pakistan Sikh Gurdwara Parbandhak Committee (PSGPC) general secretary, Gopal Chawla, raised slogans in support of Khalistan while trying to instigate Indian Sikh pilgrims from the stage at Gurdwara Panja Sahib in Pakistan. An unnamed Indian intelligence officer observed,

Interestingly, on April 12, 2019, due to the domestic political compulsions, the Canadian Government removed eight references to Sikh extremism and six references to Khalistan from its terror report - "2018 Public Report on the Terrorism Threat to Canada". Earlier, in December 2018, for the first time, the Canadian Government had listed Khalistani extremism among the threats the country is facing, in its annual federal report on terror threats since the commencement of the report in 2013. On February 21, 2018, Chief Minister Amarinder Singh had handed over a list of 'A' category operatives of BKI, KTF and ISYF to the Canadian Prime Minister, Justin Trudeau, during the latter's visit to Punjab.

The peace that has long prevailed in Punjab, after a decade and a half of Khalistani terrorism, is now being tested. Islamabad is exerting efforts to create a bond between Islamist and Khalistani terrorist formations in its stables. According to an April 8, 2019, media report, the Intelligence Bureau (IB) had warned that Ansar Ghazwat-ul-Hind and several pro-Khalistan groups would come together to disrupt the General Elections in Punjab, scheduled to be held on May 19, 2019. Seven-phase general elections are currently underway across the country, with the last phase on May 19, and the counting of votes on May 23.

There is a continuous trickle of Khalistani extremist recruitment and radicalization in the Punjab, fuelled by extremist elements in the Sikh Diaspora and generously supported and actively directed by Pakistan’s ISI. The Punjab Police and intelligence apparatus has been successful in neutralizing a large number of potential terrorists and cells within Punjab, and consequently in preventing a number of incidents. The impact within Punjab remains marginal, but any complacency would be an invitation to future disasters, and the risks of major incidents remain constantly alive.