New Delhi: Harkat-ul-Jihad-al-Islami (HuJI) means the "Islamic Struggle Movement". HuJI is an Islamist terrorist organisation active in Pakistan, Bangladesh and India since the early 1990s. The most famous HuJI operative was the commander of its 313 Brigade, Ilyas Kashmiri, who was killed in a US drone strike in South Waziristan on June 4, 2011.
HuJI was originally formed by jehadists Fazalur Rehman Khalil and Qari Saifullah Akhtar during the Soviet-Afghan War in 1984. Khalil later broke away to form his own outfit, Harkat-ul-Ansar.
After the Soviet retreat from Afghanistan, HuJI turned its attention to the Kashmir 'cause' and began exporting terror to the Indian state of Jammu and Kashmir under the patronage of ISI and the Pakistani establishment.
In the early 90s, HuJI set up operations in Bangladesh. It has been reported widely that this branch was set up with direct assistance from Osama bin Laden.
HuJI, strongly backed by the Taliban, profess a Taliban-style fundamentalist Islam and espouses a pan-Islamic ideology. It holds that Kashmir should be a part of Pakistan.
HuJI first shot to international limelight in 1995 when a plot involving the group and some fundamentalist elements in the Pakistan army was uncovered. The planned coup was designed to terminate the then Pakistan military leadership, overthrow the Benazir government and impose Islamic dictatorship on the country.
In Bangladesh, members of the group tried to murder Shamsur Rahman, the liberal poet, in 1999. HuJI was the prime suspect in a scheme to assassinate the Prime Minister of Bangladesh, Sheikh Hasina, in 2000 and was the main suspect behind a number of bombings in 2005. In October 2005, HuJI was banned by Dhaka.
In India, HuJI announced its presence outside Kashmir in 2002 when the American Centre in Kolkata was attacked. The attack was executed in collaboration with the Dawood Ibrahim-linked mafia operative.
HuJI also carried out the bombing of the Delhi-Patna Shramjeevi Express at Jaunpur in 2005.
In the same year, HuJI was implicated in the suicide bombing of the headquarters of the Andhra Pradesh Police's counter-terrorism Special Task Force. A Bangladeshi national, Mohatasin Bilal, carried out the bombing.
In 2006, Blast at the Sankat Mochan temple in Varanasi was traced to HuJI's Bangladesh-based cells.
During different times of 2008, Bangalore, Ahmedabad and Delhi witnessed serial blasts. HuJI hand was strongly suspected. However, till date, no conclusive evidence has emerged.
In 2010, Washington banned HuJI and included it in the US list of terror organisations.
An e-mail, allegedly sent by HuJI, claimed responsibility for the September 7, 2011, blast inside the Delhi High Court premise. Till this piece was put together, 11 people had died and over 76 others injured. But the National Investigation Agency (NIA) has not confirmed HuJI hand behind the act.
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