India and the Fight Against Islamic State
As India confronts the threat within its borders, could it find
common ground with the Trump administration?
By Natalie Tecimer June 14,
2017
The Islamic State (ISIS) is gaining momentum in India.
By taking a greater role in the global fight against ISIS, India can prevent
the extremist group from taking a stronger hold over its Muslim population, and
make it more difficult for radicalized Bangladeshis to carry out attacks.
Combating ISIS also provides India with the strongest basis for continued progress
on U.S.-India security cooperation under the Trump administration.
India faces an increasing domestic threat from virtual
recruitment and self-radicalization, which has resulted in some Indians
officially joining ISIS and fighting in Iraq and Syria. Also of concern is the
external threat from Bangladesh’s rising extremist population and radicalized
individuals from Bangladesh that might plan and execute attacks in India if
ISIS were to grow larger in the region.
Though there may be natural limits on the Islamic
State’s success in India (such as Indian jihadists being preoccupied by
the Kashmir conflict), ISIS’s unique online media exploitation has allowed
individuals and small groups to garner significant attention. Furthermore,
there aren’t similar natural limits on the growth of ISIS in Bangladesh. The
porous borders between Bangladesh and India and the rising tensions in refugee
camps related to the Rohingya refugee crisis are particularly concerning.
Islamic State in India
Although India’s Ministry of Home Affairs estimates that
only 75 Indians have joined ISIS, the Islamic State is growing
faster in India than many realize. Starting in 2014, cases surfaced of young
adults trying to join ISIS online, without ever having face-to-face contact
with a recruiter. In May 2014, a group of four Thane engineering students traveled to Iraq to join the
group — one returned to India, two were killed, and one is still in the fight.
ISIS attempted to plant the seeds of unrest in India in
June 2014 by including India in a map of its planned caliphate. Six months
later, ISIS named former Tehrik-e-Taliban commander Hafiz Saeed Khan as the wali
(governor) of the “Khorasan Province,” which includes India. Propaganda
about Khorasan has not gained significant traction in India, however.
In December 2014, Bangalore police arrested Mehdi Masroor Biswas for operating the Twitter account
@ShamiWitness, an ISIS propaganda account that was considered one of the most
influential ISIS Twitter handles. Biswas had personally communicated with English-speaking members of
the Islamic State and his account had international traction, including from
one of the perpetrators of the July 2016 terrorist attack in Dhaka,
Bangladesh.
In May 2016, the Islamic State released a video
featuring Indians for the first time, including one of the Thane engineering
student, Fahad Tanvir Sheikh, urging all Indian Muslims to join the
movement to grow the caliphate into India.
The National Investigation Agency (NIA) raided a
suspected ISIS cell in Hyderabad in June 2016 after discovering that the
cell ordered explosive precursor chemicals. Interrogation reports indicate that ISIS planners had
detailed knowledge of Hyderabad, and that they arranged for weapons to be
delivered in a bag on a tree branch.
On March 7, 2017, a pipe bomb exploded on a passenger train near Kalapipal,
Madhya Pradesh. Four suspects were interrogated and evidence from their
computers suggests they were radicalized online. The following day, the Uttar
Pradesh Anti Terror Squad engaged in a shootout in Lucknow with the terror suspect Saifullah,
who they believed was a member of the Islamic State Khorasan cell.
In late April 2017, the Uttar Pradesh Anti Terror Squad
and the Delhi Police Special Cell arrested three
suspects from an ISIS cell, believed to be actively recruiting,
and detained six others.
Almost half of the arrested ISIS members from India have
been linked to a single online recruiter: Shafi Armar, also known as Yusuf-al-Hindi. Armar is a
Karnataka native and is reportedly still alive and recruiting Indians virtually
from Syria.
India’s Past Actions to Counter the Rise of Islamic
State
India banned ISIS in December 2014, almost six months after UN
Security Council Resolution 2170, which officially condemned the group and
called member-states to take action against it. There are several possible
reasons why India waited to put the ban in place, perhaps the most compelling
being that ISIS held 39 Indian hostages (they were never released and have
likely been killed). Although then-Defense Minister Manohar Parrikar said that
India would fight ISIS under a UN resolution and a UN flag, the
national government was quick to downplay his comments and maintained that this
hypothetical situation would invite an evaluation of the situation, not
necessarily action.
Indian government officials participated in a number of U.S.-led summits on
extremism and ISIS during the Obama administration, though there was not
high-level participation at the first meeting of President Donald Trump’s
“Global Coalition Working to Defeat ISIS.”
Former Indian security officials cite the Intelligence
Bureau’s (IB) Operation Chukravyuh as India’s main response to Islamic
State’s growing online threat. Starting in late 2014, IB officers reportedly
posed as Islamic State recruiters on Twitter, communicating with hundreds of
Indian youth who intended to join the Islamic State.
After 21 Kerala natives left India for Iraq, Syria, and
Afghanistan, the NIA launched an investigation into the high rate of Islamic
State recruitment in the state, aided by the arrest and interrogation of Subahani Haja Moideen on October 6, 2016. Kerala is
likely a hotspot for ISIS recruitment because some self-radicalized individuals
who have joined ISIS and traveled to Iraq, Syria, or Afghanistan have returned
to Kerala and recruited others. Additionally, the Indian Mujahideen (IM), a
home-grown Indian terrorist group, has a strong presence in Kerala and after a
known IM militant, Muhammed Sajid, was killed in Syria, the links between ISIS
and the Indian Mujahideen became clearer. Both the IM and the Students’ Islamic
Movement of India (SIMI), another radical Islamic organization with a strong
presence, could help push already radicalized youth toward ISIS or serve as
direct recruiting platforms.
India must grapple with the risk that if it plays a
larger role in the global fight against ISIS it might become a target of
increased attacks. Increased counter-ISIS measures both in India and on the
global scale may add more “fuel to the fire” for radicalized individuals; in
the May 2016 ISIS propaganda video, Fahad Tanvir Sheikh vowed to avenge the
violence against Muslims in India and gave a formidable warning to India. India
has only had one ISIS attack on its soil, which is remarkable considering its
diverse population. However, the Islamic State is growing in India, and the
train bombing in Madhya Pradesh in March and the detainments in Uttar Pradesh
in April are signals that a policy change may be warranted.
India’s Potential Role in the Global Fight against the Islamic
State
The anti-ISIS effort is one of Trump’s key foreign
policy priorities, and the Trump administration will presumably be more willing
to engage with other countries who have similarly made countering ISIS a
priority. The Trump administration will likely criticize countries who are not
supporting the U.S. coalition against the Islamic State; this could impact
trade deals and other future negotiations. South Asia is critical in the fight
against ISIS and India has the potential to play a large role in the United
States’ regional strategy. To better collaborate with the United States on
countering ISIS, India should consider conducting joint counterterrorism
operations with the United States; sharing more inclusive intelligence,
including updated terrorists watch lists; and taking a firm stance against
Bangladesh’s weak response to terrorism.
As India has not been involved in the fight against ISIS
on a global scale, there have been few opportunities for U.S.-India joint
counter-ISIS operations. The CIA-NIA joint counterterrorism operation in January 2016,
where the CIA reportedly alerted the NIA to a north Indian ISIS cell, was
successful in capturing members of the cell, but it underscored a perception in
the U.S. government that the critical information-sharing is a one-way street.
India can widen its information sharing network to
include its complete, updated terrorist watch lists with the United States
regularly. Although the 2014 Joint Statement mentioned identifying areas where
terrorist watch lists could be exchanged, there has been no indication that
this exchange has officially taken place and how frequently the watch lists
would be updated.
Another potential point of contention between the United
States and India is over Bangladesh. India supports Prime Minister Sheikh
Hasina and her government, but, until recently, Bangladesh has been slow to act
against ISIS. India’s strong support of Hasina’s government must be tempered by
strong condemnation of its response to ISIS terrorism. India’s support of the
Bangladesh government could open the door for coordinated ISIS attacks in the
future, and for Bangladeshi ISIS fighters to make their way into India. India
should align its approach to the Bangladeshi government with that of the United
States and coordinate intelligence and information sharing appropriately.
ISIS poses a significant threat to India, but India has
not been engaged in the global fight against the group. Virtual
self-radicalization is a growing problem and it might quickly escalate,
possibly into kinetic attacks. If India becomes more involved in the global
fight against the Islamic State by working closely with the United States in
the region, sharing terrorist watch lists, and taking a stronger stance against
Bangladesh, it can have a stronger partner to fight the growing domestic threat
of ISIS while making a global contribution that Trump will likely value.
Natalie Tecimer is a research associate and program
manager with the Wadhwani Chair in U.S.-India Policy Studies at the Center
for Strategic and International Studies.
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