KARACHI: Indian Defense Minister Rajnath Singh’s admission that India operates its death squads on foreign soil is not surprising as this fact has been known to the international intelligence community for a long time, but this is the first time India has admitted.
In an interview to Indian channel, Rajnath Singh said that the terrorist who tries to disturb the peace of India will be given a befitting reply, if he escapes to Pakistan, he will go there and kill him. Prime Minister Modi has declared this policy correct.
The British newspaper Guardian claimed in its report that the Indian government had extrajudicially killed at least 20 people in Pakistan since 2020. Although the Indian Foreign Ministry rejected the British newspaper’s report as negative propaganda, Rajnath Singh’s confession negates this denial.
Before Rajnath Singh, Prime Minister Modi proudly mentioned the government’s policy of killing in foreign countries in an election rally, but did not name any country, while talking about Pakistan. Prime Minister Modi and Rajnath Singh’s antics are understandable given the election season in India, they want to ensure electoral success by pushing the narrative of national security and terrorism and fueling nationalism.
According to Michael Kugelman, director of the South Asia Institute’s Wilson Center, the timing of the British newspaper’s report is significant, adding that the report has reinforced the BJP’s nationalist narrative.
A few weeks before the last Indian general election, the Modi government staged a surgical strike in Balakot, paving the way for its electoral success by igniting a dangerous confrontation with the economically distressed BJP government. Indian politicians, including West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee, raised questions about the Pulwama incident by calling it a staged drama.
According to the former Governor of Occupied Kashmir, Satya Pal Malik, the Modi government ensured its electoral success by blaming Pakistan for the Pulwama incident and retaliating. The BJP-dominated media also played a major role in this success, portraying Prime Minister Modi as a strong leader who can deal with external threats to national security and make India a great power.
According to Ashok Swain, a professor at the University of Sweden, if Modi felt that he might face an electoral defeat, he would only signal to the Indian media to exaggerate the image of him as a strong leader, which in Pakistan Killed the terrorists. There are common fears that Prime Minister Modi may stage another Pulwama-like drama in order to run for a third term, provided he finds that the political benefits of such an adventure outweigh its costs.
The way Pakistan responded to the Balakot attack, India had to bear a heavy loss. Defense analyst Mohammad Ali said that after this defeat, the Modi administration decided to reframe its policy based on an assessment of cost and political gain, thus creating a new policy that included using its intelligence agency to target other political opponents. It involves targeting countries and killing them at the hands of local mercenaries and terrorists.
According to Kugelman, the Indian intelligence “RAW” is actually following the policies of Russian and Israeli intelligence, which often use the policy of killing opponents living abroad. Security sources said that India recruits hired killers through social media, they include members of extremist organizations in addition to criminal elements, on many occasions they also recruited fighters of the outlawed TTP, calling them “RA”. In addition to providing targets with verified addresses, photographs, weapons, and payments, agents of the ‘supplies’ have separate teams of spotters and funders, and detailed exit plans to avoid being easily spotted. The hired killers are Pakistani or Afghani, controlled by RAW sleeper cells in third countries.
