According to National Investigation Agency (NIA), the Chief of Hizbul Mujahideen, Syed Salahuddin, directs and teaches the banned terror outfit United Jihad Council (UJC) cadres. He is the leader of UJC, which acts as an umbrella organisation for 13 Kashmir-centric terror outfits based out in Pakistan as it gets direct support from the Pakistan army.
Salahuddin’s real name is Mohammed Yusuf Shah. He took this nom de guerre on the name of Saladin, a 12th-century Muslim political and military leader who fought the Crusades. From Pakistan, he has been training and leading terrorists of the UJC.
As per the agency reports, UJC, also known as Muttahida Jihad Council (MJC), supports and administers 13 other Kashmir-centric terror outfits. These 13 terror outfits operate out of Pakistan as it’s funded and supported. These outfits are: Harakat-ul-Ansar, Hizb-ul-Mujahideen, Jamiat-ul-Mujahideen, Al-Jihad, Al-Barq, Al-Badr, Ikhwan-ul-Mussalmin, Tehrik-ul-Mujahideen, Lashkar-e-Toiba, Hizb-ul-Mujahideen, Harkat-ul-Mujahideen, Al-Badr, and Tehrik-i-Jihad.
In 1993, terrorist Salahuddin fled to Pakistan. He is currently 77 years old, and in October 2020, he was designated as an individual terrorist by India. NIA added that he continues to operate from Pakistan.
On April 24, National Investigation Agency (NIA) attached the properties of Syed Ahmed Shakeel, the younger son of Hizbul Mujahideen chief, in Srinagar/Budgam of Kashmir, under relevant sections of the Unlawful Activities Prevention Act (UAPA), 1967.
Similarly, in 2021, in a successful attempt to cripple the nexus of the funding of terror activities in the valley, the Jammu and Kashmir administration sacked his two other sons, Syed Ahmad Shakeel and Shahid Yousuf, from their Government jobs, as they were found to be involved in terror funding.
According to sources, the NIA followed both sons’ terror funding trails. Authorities discovered Syed Ahmad Shakeel and Shahid Yousuf were involved in raising, receiving, collecting, and transferring funds for Hizbul Mujahideen terror activities via Hawala transactions.
After their arrests in October 2017 and August 2018, Shahid Yusuf and Syed Ahmed Shakeel were lodged in Delhi’s Tihar Jail, respectively. They were charged on April 20 and November 20, 2018, respectively.
NIA said, “Yusuf and Shakeel had been receiving funds from abroad from the associates of their father and overground workers of Hizbul Mujahideen, besides instigating and operationalising militant activities in India, primarily in Kashmir valley, Syed Salahuddin has been raising funds and routing finances to India through trade routes, Hawala channels, and international money transfer channels for furthering the terrorist activities of Hizbul Mujahideen cadres”.
While probing the money laundering trail in a terror funding case, the Enforcement Directorate alleged that Jammu Kashmir Affectees Relief Trust (JKART) was used as a front which helped Hizbul Mujahideen receive Rs 80 crore between 2004 and 2011 to carry out terror activities in India. This whole operation was carried out under the command of Salahuddin.
In June 2017, the US Department of State declared him a specially designated global terrorist. Before joining and operating the terror activities in the valley, Salahuddin unsuccessfully contested the Amirakadal constituency during Jammu and Kashmir Assembly elections in 1987.
