India taking coherent actions to counter Pak-sponsored terror: Former EU parliament member

Terming Pakistan as a propagator of the "most violent form of cross-border terrorism", a former member of European Parliament (MEP) from Portugal lauded India's recent moves to counter the menace perpetrated by the Islamic nation and said the international community will continue to support New Delhi's efforts.

India has been a major victim of terrorism, especially "jihadism", which is plaguing countries in South Asia apart from the Middle East, said Paulo Casaca, Executive Director of the South Asia Democratic Forum who highlighted the various steps taken by India in recent times to counter Pakistan's designs.

Casaca's views appeared in an article titled 'India's new impetus on confronting terrorism' in EP Today, the European Parliament's monthly magazine.

The former MEP said that India's move to implement the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Amendment Bill, 2019, has been backed by the US State Department, and symbolises New Delhi authority's newly reinforced priority in confronting terrorism.

The Bill allows both central and state governments to designate individuals and organisations as terrorist actors.

"Although driven by non-state actors, terrorism may be promoted by states, and this is exactly what happens in South Asia, where the most violent terrorism is promoted by Pakistan. Pakistan acts in a cross border modality, mostly through Jihadi groups - the country itself openly espouses a sort of national-Islamist ideology - but also through other sort of groups and logics," the writer stated.

On September 5, India announced a programme aimed at combatting fanatic indoctrination under the slogan 'Tell the world, Indian Muslims are not global terrorists'. This initiative is designed to counter and to check indoctrination of prison inmates and prevent mob mobilisation through disinformation spread by social media.

"Indian authorities understood that the first psychological impact intended by jihadism is to establish an affective relation between a small minority of fanatics and the vast majority of moderate Muslims," said Casaca.

"The erroneous reaction from the populations targeted by jihadism, which amalgamates jihadists with Islam, actually serves jihadist's interests, and must, therefore, be combatted," he stated.

Another decision, Casaca said, taken by authorities in a pro-active way is the 'social jihadi ideology'.

Under this ideology, the triple talaq, or instant divorce by uttering the word 'talaq' thrice by a Muslim man to his wife, was criminalised by the Indian Parliament in July this year after facing several legal and political obstacles.

Among all these initiatives taken, the most prominent step taken by India was the abrogation of Article 370 that granted special status to Jammu and Kashmir. Explaining the move, Prime Minister Narendra Modi said that it was done to liberate the region from clutches of terror and integrate it with the rest of the country.

"The political logic of this constitutional reform becomes easier to understand if we consider it in the context of this larger package of measures geared at combatting terrorism. The main concept is that the struggle against terrorism cannot be seen as an issue exclusively for the state's coercive forces to tackle," Casaca underlined.

The former MEP said that more set of actions are needed, which include integration with the world community's fight against terror, opposition of fanning fanatic interpretation of religion and most importantly, the creation of a more inclusive message.

Apart from all these steps to combat terror, Indian authorities are giving out a strong message in terms of the country's economic development, which should include Jammu and Kashmir and address the needs of the marginalised groups, said Casaca.

"The strategy seems coherent and we can only expect that the international community and the European Union will provide the support it needs," the former MEP concluded in his article.