Preface to this Article:This article is being posted here to show the perspective of Tehelka about 26/11 and related info. It necessarily do not have to agree with the other posts in this blog. As said, its a platform where all the perspectives are presented leaving the discerning reader to decide.I personally do not agree with most of the information shared here in this article. So the readers may use it to debunk it.

The interrogation of the surviving Mumbai killer, Kasav, is a chronicle of rigorous training and a ruthlessly planned terror strike, says RANA AYYUB

The last resort: Kasav undergoing surgery

THE CONFESSIONS of 21-year-old Kasav, the only 26/11 terrorist to have been captured, have made revelations that, investigators say, seem to confirm the links of the Lashkar-e-Tayyeba (LeT) with the attack. With interrogation establishing Kasav as a Pakistani national, the Crime Branch has also verified that the nine other terrorists killed during the attack were from Pakistan as well. Kasav is said to have broken down on various occasions during his interrogations and has apparently requested to be allowed to write to his family to tell them he regretted what he had done, that he was as good as dead and that the realisation that the path he had taken was wrong had come too late.

Originally from Faridkot village in Punjab province, Kasav comes from a very poor family. A Class IV dropout, he went to work early as a labourer to supplement his family’s income. After becoming involved in various petty thefts, he came in contact with LeT operatives who promised to help his family financially if, as they told him, he worked on the path of Allah and waged jehad. Kasav has told his interrogators that he was trained in a team of 24 who were incited with footage of the Babri Masjid demolition and the Gujarat riots. Kasav said the camp gave him, for the first time in his life, a sense of purpose.

The 24 terror trainees were trained for close to two years at the LeT’s Daurae- Khaas training camp at Mansera in Muzaffarabad in Pakistan and in various other parts of Pakistan-occupied Kashmir. The training offered was strenuous in nature and involved instruction in various close combat techniques, hostage taking, handling explosives and various arms, satellite navigation and survival methods on the high seas. According to Deven Bharati, Additional CP (Crime), Kasav has identified several of his trainers, among them Kahafa, Saif ur Rehman, Abu Hamza, Abu Saha, Zaki ur Rehman Lakhvi and Yusuf Muzammil, the military commander of the LeT, also known as Abu Hurreira or Yahya, whose satellite phone conversation was intercepted by RAW officials on November 18. According to Bharati, Kasab has also said that he had met Hafiz Saeed, the head of the Jamaat-ud-Daawa, on various occasions. Kasav has apparently also claimed that Zaki-ur-Rehman, the group’s operating chief also known as Chacha, had selected him for the attack and was a key person in its planning and execution.

According to the global positioning system (GPS) and the satellite phone found on the fishing boat Al-Kuber as per the information given by Kasav, calls were traced to Lakhvi and Muzammil, who the terrorists were in touch with. The terrorists all carried cell phones which they were told not to use before they reached Mumbai. When in Mumbai, they used the satellite phone to call Lakhvi, who directed them to kill Amar Singh Solanki, one of the Kuber’s navigators who was taken hostage and later killed. Bharati, however, refused to divulge details on the other calls made.

KASAV HAS also solved the puzzle regarding the blasts in the taxis. According to Maria, Kasab has told investigators that he and Ismail Khan, his accomplice in the

The RDX factor: The terrorists also planned to bomb Mumbai Photo: Shailendra Pandey

attack at Chhatrapati Shivaji Terminus (CST), had planted the bomb that exploded at Dockyard Road while others planted the one that went off at Vile Parle. “The intention was to create as much damage, chaos and confusion as possible so they could easily reach their destinations and cause maximum damage,” says Maria. However the original plan failed after the RDX devices they had planted at various places failed to go off. It was also revealed that the terrorists had bought 10 RDX bombs, each weighing around eight kgs.

Another crucial bit of evidence is the diary the Crime Branch found on the Kuber. The diary, written in Urdu, has details of the duties assigned to each of the ten terrorists before they reached Mumbai. Maria said, “The diary shows there were just 10 terrorists as their names are clearly mentioned along with the duties assigned to them.” While the 15 blankets found on board raised apprehensions that there could be more people involved, Maria said they were brought in just in case anyone needed an extra one and had nothing to do with presence of other terrorists.

Another interesting link drawn from Kasav’s revelations has been that of LeT operative Faheem Ansari, presently in the custody of the Uttar Pradesh Special Task Force for an attack on a CRPF camp in Rampur. In an Anti-Terrorism Squad report filed in February, Faheem, who had reached Pakistan in February 2007, named Zaki-ur-Rehman Lakhvi, Muzammil and Kahafa as the LeT operatives who trained him and who had asked him to pinpoint important places from maps in Mumbai. Ansari had also done a recce of the city and had provided photographs and videos to Kahafa. A team of Crime Branch officials have left for UP to seek Faheem’s transit remand.

Meanwhile, the first arrests related to the case have been made in Kolkata with the detention of two Indian nationals, Tauseef Rehman and Mukhtar Ahmed. Rehman, who purchased the SIM cards the terrorists used and later sold them to Mukhtar, gave them to Muzammil through another operative. Officials are also looking at investigating local links in the case. The Crime Branch is yet to confirm the theory; it is also playing it safe with Kasav. But, with Kasav’s narco test likely to be done soon, the missing links in the case might just come out.