The Lover Boy of Bahawalpur

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The Lover Boy of Bahawalpur: How the Pulwama Case was Cracked
The Lover Boy of Bahawalpur.jpg
First edition
Author Rahul Pandita
LanguageEnglish
Publisher Juggernaut Books
Publication date
23 June 2021
Media typePrint (hardcover)
Pages212
ISBN 978-9391165109

The Lover Boy of Bahawalpur: How the Pulwama Case was Cracked is a non-fiction book written by Rahul Pandita and published in 2021. [1] The book tells the story of a team of National Investigation Agency (NIA) sleuths cracking the 2019 Pulwama attack case. [2] The "lover boy" referred to in the title is Mohammad Umar Farooq (son of Ibrahim Athar, one of the five terrorists who had hijacked the Indian Airlines Flight IC 814 in December 1999), nephew of Jaish founder Masood Azhar and a key accused in the case. [3] [4] He was killed during an encounter a month after Pulwama attack. [5] Rakesh Balwal, the Jammu and Kashmir head of the NIA was tasked with the 2019 Pulwama attack case probe at that time. [6]

Contents

Background

NIA managed to connect the dots at the time of the abrogation of Article 370 when a mobile phone full of lustful messages was recovered after an encounter that killed Umar Farooq.

Key people involved

Reception

The Wire journalist Karan Thapar wrote of the book, "Pandita has an incredible story to tell which some may find hard to believe. Others may be sceptical [...] But there will also be many who will accept Pandita’s detailed story." [7]

See also

Related Research Articles

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Indian Airlines Flight 814, commonly known as IC 814, was an Indian Airlines Airbus A300 en route from Tribhuvan International Airport in Kathmandu, Nepal, to Indira Gandhi International Airport in Delhi, India, on Friday, 24 December 1999, when it was hijacked and was flown to several locations before landing in Kandahar, Afghanistan.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">All Parties Hurriyat Conference</span> Political alliance in Kashmir

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<span class="mw-page-title-main">Jaish-e-Mohammed</span> Islamic Jihadist organisation

Jaish-e-Mohammed is a Pakistan-based Deobandi Jihadist terrorist group active in Kashmir. The group's primary motive is to separate Kashmir from India and merge it into Pakistan.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Afzal Guru</span> Kashmiri terrorist

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Mohammad Masood Azhar Alvi is a radical Islamist and terrorist, being the founder and leader of the Pakistan-based terrorist organisation Jaish-e-Mohammed, active mainly in the Pakistani-administered portion of the Kashmir region. His actions are not limited to the South Asian region; for instance, BBC News described him as "the man who brought jihad to Britain." On 1 May 2019, Masood Azhar was listed as an international terrorist by the United Nations Security Council.

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Kamran Yusuf, also known as Kamran Yousuf is a Kashmiri multimedia journalist. As of 2022, Kamran is a staffer at NewsClick. He also works as a freelance multimedia journalist for various international organisations. In 2017, he was booked under UAPA and lodged at Tihar Jail. Many national as well as international organisations including Committee to Protect Journalists, the International Federation of Journalists, Amnesty International and more issued statements for his immediate release. He got bail after six months and was discharged from all the charges on 16 March 2022 by Delhi court.

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The 2019 Balakot airstrike was a bombing raid conducted by Indian warplanes on 26 February 2019 in Balakot, Pakistan, against an alleged training camp of the terrorist group Jaish-e-Mohammed. Open source satellite imagery has revealed that no targets of consequence were hit. The following day, Pakistan shot down an Indian warplane and took its pilot, Abhinandan Varthaman, as prisoner. Indian anti-aircraft fire downed an Indian helicopter killing six or seven airmen on board, their deaths receiving perfunctory coverage by Indian media. India claimed that a Pakistani F-16 fighter jet was downed, but that claim has been debunked. The airstrike was used by India's ruling party to bolster its patriotic appeal in the general elections of April 2019.

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References

  1. Vij, RK (2021-07-18). "How 'The Lover Boy of Bahawalpur' reopens the Pulwama case". The Indian Express. Retrieved 2021-08-17.
  2. Bhardwaj, Ananya (1 July 2021). "Drones threat flagged for long but govt slept over it, journalist-author Rahul Pandita claims". ThePrint. Retrieved 17 August 2021.
  3. Bhardwaj, Ananya (2020-08-25). "Afghanistan training, help from 12 Kashmiris, RDX from Pakistan — how Pulwama was 'planned'". ThePrint. Retrieved 2021-08-17.
  4. Philip, Snehesh Alex (2021-07-31). "JeM terrorist and Pulwama attack conspirator killed in encounter in J&K". ThePrint. Retrieved 2021-08-17.
  5. Sandhu, Kamaljit Kaur (26 August 2021). "NIA traces Pulwama mastermind Jaish commander Umar Farooq's al-Qaeda link". India Today. Retrieved 2021-08-17.
  6. Raaj, Neelam (20 June 2021). "3 things nailed Pulwama mastermind: Adidas jacket, Kashmiri lover, and a damaged mobile". The Times of India. Retrieved 2021-08-17.
  7. "Watch | The 'Incredible Strokes of Luck' Behind How Pulwama Terrorists Were Identified". The Wire. 25 June 2021. Retrieved 2021-08-17.