One of many Lashkar-e-Toiba (LeT) terrorist centres that Indian armed forces claimed to have attacked throughout Operation Sindoor – the Markaz Taiba in Muridke, close to Lahore, deep in Pakistan – is notorious because the camp the place the terrorists concerned within the 26/11 Mumbai assaults had been skilled.
Lengthy earlier than the 2008 assaults on Mumbai, within the early years of the LeT’s Markaz Taiba camp at Muridke, an Indian origin terrorist who is without doubt one of the prime accused within the December 28, 2005, LeT assault on the Indian Institute of Science in Bengaluru – which killed an IIT professor from Delhi, M C Puri – was additionally skilled on the centre.
Sabahuddin Ahmed, 40, who was 20 years outdated when he facilitated the IISc assault in Bengaluru, skilled as a young person on the Markaz Taiba camp in 2002-03 and offered early insights on the actions on the camp, in keeping with police stories compiled in UP and Karnataka following his arrest in UP in January 2008.
Ahmed, who’s being held in a jail in UP, is at the moment present process trial in a Bengaluru particular courtroom for the IISc assault. Prices had been framed towards him in 2021 for the 2005 LeT terror assault on IISc – the place he used the camouflage of a scholar at an area faculty to arrange a base in Bengaluru for the eventual assault by LeT gunman ‘Abu Hamza’, who arrived from Pakistan.
By the way, the primary attacker within the IISc case, ‘Abu Hamza’, can be linked to the 2008 Mumbai assaults as one of many trainers on the Markaz Taiba camp. Whereas Sabahuddin Ahmed was additionally initially linked to the Mumbai assaults as a supplier of knowledge on key places in Mumbai to his LeT handlers, he was acquitted within the case in 2011.
Sabahuddin Ahmed, who hails from Bihar, is reported to have attended the LeT camp at Muridke within the 2002-03 interval as a 17-year-old after being reportedly recognized by LeT leaders for participating in terrorist actions in India. Ahmed is reported to have been drawn to the LeT by speeches made by LeT chief Hafiz Saeed in Lahore in 2002. Ahmed was amongst a bunch of jihad trainees from India despatched through Kashmir to Pakistan in 2002.
Sabahuddin Ahmad, who spent two durations with Lashkar leaders, first in 2002-2003 after which in 2006, when he escaped after the IISc assault, instructed police interrogators that LeT navy commander Zaki-ur-Rehman Lakhvi personally advisable him to the Inter-Companies Intelligence (ISI) of the Pakistan military after his recruitment.
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“He requested me to go to the ISI company and work with them as they wanted a devoted jihadi for the work,” Sabahuddin Ahmed alias Saba alias Farhan instructed investigators in 2008 concerning his first coaching tenure in Pakistan in 2002-03. In line with accounts gathered by safety businesses, Ahmed was in a LeT protected home at Muridke for over three months in late 2002 and early 2003.
After his coaching concluded in March 2003, Sabahuddin Ahmed mentioned he was given Rs 25,000 and was dropped on the Lahore airport by an ISI official. Within the subsequent days after his coaching, Sabahuddin Ahmed mentioned he stayed in contact with solely his LeT handlers – Muzammil alias Yousuf and his then second in command Abdul Aziz, from whom he acquired orders for an assault in Bengaluru.
Ahmed’s LeT handlers from the 2005 interval are by the way additionally linked to the 2008 Mumbai assaults, with Abdul Aziz alias Wali alias Rehan additionally linked to the July 25, 2008, serial blasts in Bengaluru and a plot to recruit Kerala youths for terror coaching in an LeT camp in Pakistan-occupied Kashmir (PoK) in 2008.
In line with the accounts given to Indian businesses by Ahmed in 2008, his essential LeT handler Muzammil alias Yousuf, who was round 28 in 2002, was a key LeT commander on the Muridke camp who was in-charge of operations within the Pulwama, Anantnag, Doda and Kishtwar districts of Kashmir other than holding duty for operations in the remainder of India.
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In line with Sabahuddin Ahmed’s account, it was Muzammil who directed him to arrange a base in Bengaluru in preparation for an assault, other than coordinating the assault and selecting the IISc as one in every of three targets within the metropolis.
“After I questioned Sabahuddin about his actions in Bengaluru, he said that in 2004, he was instructed by the chief of Lashkar-e-Toiba to attend a convention of scientists at IISc, Bengaluru, and conduct a terrorist assault on the occasion,” a deputy superintendent of police of the UP STF instructed the Bengaluru particular courtroom for terrorism just lately throughout the trial of the IISc case.
“He additionally said that he was directed by the chief of Lashkar-e-Toiba to go to Kashmir. Accordingly, he visited and picked up an AK-47 rifle, three magazines, and 4 hand grenades. He then went to Bengaluru and carried out the assault at IISC, together with Hamza, which resulted within the dying of 1 scientist and accidents to a number of others. After the assault, they fled to Pakistan by way of totally different routes,” mentioned the UP official who was concerned within the January 2008 arrest of Ahmed.
After the execution of the IISc assault in 2005, the LeT made Sabahuddin Ahmed the world commander for Nepal with a base in Kathmandu, however he was arrested after an LeT assault on a CRPF camp on December 31, 2007.
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The Markaz Taiba Coaching Centre of the LeT in Muridke was established within the 12 months 2000 and includes a posh unfold over 82 acres with a madrasa, residential quarters, school rooms, sports activities fields, a market, fish farms, and agricultural land, in keeping with statements from India’s Ministry of Exterior Affairs (MEA).
“It’s right here that ideological indoctrination, non secular conditioning, and navy coaching happen – for each native and overseas recruits. The centre enrols roughly a thousand college students yearly, forming the organisational spine of LeT,” Indian officers mentioned this week.
“Though LeT has been formally designated as a terrorist organisation by quite a few worldwide our bodies, Pakistan continues to permit it to function freely. In 2024-2025, Markaz Taiba hosted a collection of public occasions, the place open requires violence in Kashmir and inflammatory rhetoric towards Israel and Western nations had been delivered,” officers added.
“Markaz Taiba stays not merely a coaching facility, however a completely operational strategic hub for LeT’s ideological and militant actions in direct violation of worldwide sanctions and Pakistan’s said commitments,” Indian overseas officers said.
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“Targeted strikes had been carried out on 9 terrorist infrastructure websites in Pakistan and Pakistan-occupied Jammu and Kashmir, focusing on the roots of cross-border terror planning. Importantly, no Pakistani navy amenities had been hit, reflecting India’s calibrated and non-escalatory strategy. This operation underscores India’s resolve to carry perpetrators accountable whereas avoiding pointless provocation,” the Ministry of Defence mentioned after Operation Sindoor.