Pakistan using cash donated at shrines to spread terror in India: Report

Recently arrested ISI spy in Rajasthan revealed how such donations were being used to fund terror

Pakistan's intelligence agency, the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI), has been using money collected from donation boxes set up by its agents at shrines in Rajasthan to fund terrorist activities in the state's border villages, the Times of India reported on Thursday while citing recently arrested ISI spy Deena Khan's interrogation. 

According to the report, Khan, who ran a small Mazar in the Chohtan village of the state's Barmer district, revealed to his interrogators from the Rajasthan police that he had distributed Rs 3.5 lakh from the donations to the Mazar to other ISI spies. A senior intelligence officer from the state told the national daily that these funds were passed on to other ISI spies like Satram Maheswari and his nephew Vinod Maheswari, among others. 

Khan, the report added, got his instructions on how to distribute these funds from his ISI handlers over phone. 

According to another report by the national daily on June 2, Khan and his two assistants were arrested by the state police under the Official Secrets Act. According to the same report, Maheswari and his nephew were arrested three months ago, and it was the investigation into their activities that netted Khan. 

Better than hawala?

The national daily was also informed by security officials that these donation boxes were safer for such nefarious purposes than even the perennially popular hawala route for funding terrorism. 

Just last month, Altaf Qureshi, a 37-year-old hawala operator, who allegedly funded a suspected ISI agent, was arrested.

As reported earlier, Qureshi was arrested from the Masjid Bunder area in South Mumbai in a joint operation by the Uttar Pradesh and Maharashtra anti-terrorism squads. Qureshi had allegedly deposited money in the bank account of arrested ISI agent Aftab Ali in Lucknow for carrying out espionage activities, police sources had been quoted as saying.

ATS officials seized a cellphone and Rs 71.57 lakh in cash from Qureshi's house. 

The hawala operator, who was in the business at the behest of one Jawed Naviwala, was nabbed after his name cropped up during Aftab's interrogation. Aftab was arrested just days before Qureshi.

Aftab, booked under the Official Secrets Act, had allegedly passed on information about the Indian Army's movements to officers posted at the Pakistan High Commission and also to the ISI, police officials claimed.

He had allegedly provided information about the army's movements and units in Faizabad, Lucknow and Amritsar.