In order to preempt its resurgence, the Union Home Ministry, has outlawed it as a terrorist group so that none of its activities can manage to mutate into an organised and subversive movement
By Shujaat Ali Quadri
Mainland India has been almost totally freed of the scourge of terrorism in recent years. A surreptitious peril, however, lurks. This threat comes from a terrorist outfit called the Hizb-ut-Tahrir (HuT).
According to sources, besides occasional discovery of sleeper cells of ISIS and Al Qaeda, HuT, a transnational group, is reportedly planning to come out of hibernation to stir disturbances across India. In order to preempt its resurgence, the Union Home Ministry in the BJP-led government in Delhi, has outlawed it as a terrorist group so that none of its activities can manage to mutate into an organised and subversive movement.
HuT was born in Jerusalem in 1953. Its founder was Sheikh Taqiuddin al-Nabhani, a salafi. Its was then seeking to establish a global Caliphate through ways ingrained and taught by Salafism and Wahhabism — both hardline Islamist ideologies. Initially, it was limited to Arab lands, but as jihadist elements travelled to distant countries such as Pakistan and Afghanistan, Asian countries like Bangladesh and India began to blip on their radar.
In India, it was active as a socio-religio-political group till about 2010. It operated under a pseudonym, the Muslim Intellectual Forum. It was then an advocacy group that would organise assemblies even in Delhi’s posh areas like Lodhi Colony. The main thrust of the organisation was to build up intellectual support for the establishment of the Islamic Caliphate and prepare for wider support.
As the Arab Spring broke out in the Middle East in and around 2010, and amid the clarion call for ‘democracy in the Islamic world’, mostly ruled by undemocratic and totalitarian regimes, India launched a crackdown on radical outfits. The HuT sank into oblivion.
Its second ‘most-happening’ destination was Bangladesh, with a Muslim majority population. Indeed, it was at the vanguard of the extremist forces that sought the dethronement of the secular government of Sheikh Hasina-led Awami League in Dhaka. Despite its cadres being jailed, it did not relent. And now, as Hasina is facing an uncertain future in exile in India, after her forced ouster from power, the HuT seems to have discovered a golden opportunity to assimilate in the ruling system and push its global Caliphate dream.
The warning
The Hudson Institute, a premier research organisation based in the US, has recently published an important report about the impending threat to Bangladesh and India from a revved up HuT. The regime change in Bangladesh has proved to be a booster shot for the outfit and the group plans to spread its wings in Asia, making Dhaka its epicenter, the report says.
Hannah Stuart and Houriya Ahmed, fellows in the Hudson Institute, underscore that HuT’s South Asian operations are driven by a long-term strategy aimed at recruiting local and diaspora communities, with particular focus on Bangladesh, Pakistan and India.
Interestingly, the report says, HuT has been growing in the United Kingdom despite a lavish war on terror waged so pompously by the West. UK-based members are alleged to have been involved in setting up HuT in Pakistan and Bangladesh, the report claims. Public demonstrations, rallies, and clandestine recruitment efforts are key methods of the group.
The Hudson report highlights how HuT’s goals extend beyond Bangladesh and Pakistan, with an eye on India’s large Muslim population, which has been historically secular and pro-democracy. Sources allege that their leaders believe that an established Caliphate in Pakistan could eventually influence India’s Muslim minority. This strategy, if realised, could destabilise India’s internal security by sowing divisions among various communities.
Threat to India: How to counter it?
The Union Home Ministry, while declaring HuT as a terror group, has said that it had been promoting terrorism by using various social media platforms, secure apps, and by conducting ‘Dawah’ meetings to encourage gullible youth to indulge in acts of terrorism. The ministry has reported over 300 cases of ‘radicalisation’ between 2014 and 2020, illustrating the appeal of extremist narratives among various segments of the population. HuT’s ideology, even while not promoting violence directly, could exacerbate these trends.
Its obvious target is the Muslim youth which comprise about 47 per cent of the 200 million Muslim citizens in India. Endemic socio-economic challenges, massive unemployment, and lack of opportunities, make the youth vulnerable to the group’s radical propaganda.
The group uses social media to build up its online presence, and propagate its agenda. This helps in expanding its reach to areas where it needs to recruit followers and raise resources.
The social media is an easy tool for groups like HuT. It has used this medium like a weapon triggering the recent political upheaval and consequent changes in Bangladesh.
According to the Hudson report, a separate media wing handles the group’s social media operations. It latches on to every incident of alleged or real ‘victimisation of Muslims’ to whip up ‘fundamentalist, Islamist emotions’. It thereby circulates ‘religious literature’ calling for a Caliphate, both online and offline.
Hizb-ut-Tahrir poses a specific threat to India’s national security because of its extremist ideology and global reach. Its existence can exacerbate conflicts between communities, challenge our deeply entrenched secular ideals, and create more pathways for extremism.
Thus, the threat posed by HuT on the Indian landscape is utterly grim. Nevertheless, it is not impossible to stop it. In fact, India is making crucial strides in monitoring and countering cyber propaganda.
Even a bevy of independent organisations are devoted solely for this purpose. Indian online fact-checkers and trend-busters, who are trained and committed professionals, and who relentlessly expose fake news and diabolical propaganda, are acknowledged the world-over. India has to fortify this important front with more vigour and encouragement.
It should limit HuT’s reach and defend its democratic and secular underpinnings from this new challenge by adopting a proactive strategy that combines digital vigilance, community involvement, and international cooperation.
Moreover, India has to rope in popular Muslim groups that could take this message to the Muslim masses that the spirit of Indian Constitution is in accordance with the basic spirit of exclusive respect to Islamic values and traditions. Muslim clerics must teach the youth that in the Holy Quran, Allah says that he created man as his caliph (vicegerent) on earth, and that he has to rule the hearts of people with his perfect conduct, good manners and a just and honest life. Certainly, such a ‘caliphate of character’ can be achieved.
In addition, one syncretic aspect of our composite and secular culture remains largely unrecognised. Indeed, common, united celebration of our multiple festivals, and participation of cross-religious and cross-cultural personalities in social programmes should be a must.
For example, in spite of its relentless vitriol, a BJP MP could be invited to a programme organised by Muslims on a theme of social importance. It might succeed in changing the MP’s entrenched ideas and beliefs, and, thereby, his subsequent rhetoric has the possibility of being laced with assimilative and inclusive metaphors. Historically, this pattern has occurred many times.
Similarly, there are a number of other social programmes linked to some government schemes that demand cross-religious and cross-cultural participation. Both the Hindu and Muslim leadership must motivate their followers to take active part in such events.
They should also awaken common, rural and poor folk about various welfare schemes run for them and how to take benefits from them. This will certainly build a long-lasting human bridge among the communities that no fundamentalist ideology, whether active in the virtual world, or in any other social and political universe, can shatter. This is bound to endure for life.
This is how the social fabric of India has been woven since the non-violent freedom movement, and since independence. Undoubtedly, this works as a solid and tangible bedrock against serious threats to its secular unity that crop up time and again.
Dr Shujaat Ali Qadri is Editor, Digital Forensics Research and Analytics Centre (DFRAC), a fact-checkers media organisation based in Delhi.
Picture credit: Hudson.org