India, don't let a jihadist spoil your party

We are surrounded by jihad, at once harsh, cruel and unsparing. And yet it attracts adherents by the thousands – from middle-class homes in the Arabian Gulf, the slums of Pakistan, the suburbia of Britain, and the shanty towns of west Europe, all of them zealous converts to violence and martyrdom. While India has been familiar with home-grown and cross-border jihad, we are now experiencing the first reverberations of global jihad, with the Islamic State (IS) and al Qaeda at their centre.

Last week, a 24-year-old IT technician, Mehdi Masroor Biswas was exposed as a major virtual activist of the IS, operating from Bangalore a site, @ShamiWitness, to which he had contributed 129,000 tweets and had a following of nearly 20,000, a few hundred of them English-speaking fighters of the IS. He is part of a sophisticated effort of the IS to use the internet to publicise its achievements and attract new fighters. It has a recruitment video called: “The Chosen few of Distant Lands”, which is available in Urdu, Hindi and Tamil. An organisation devoted to attracting Indian fighters, Ansar al-Tawhid fi bilad al-Hind (supporters of the faith in India) uses different social media in Indian languages to appeal to Indian Muslims.

These efforts have met with modest success so far in that four Indians from Kalyan in North Mumbai were persuaded to make the journey to Iraq to join the IS. One of them, Arif Majeed, an engineering student, who had described his departure as a "blessed journey", has since returned and has spoken of his disillusionment with the activities of his co-fighters and the menial role assigned to him in the jihad.

Disgruntled

In Tamil Nadu, a cleric has distributed T-shirts emblazoned with the IS symbol, while disgruntled youth in Srinagar have been spotted with the IS flag. The IS has been more effective elsewhere: besides several thousand Arabs, the IS has attracted about 2,500 jihadis from Western countries, some of them recent converts to Islam, including a few women.

What attracts these young people to abandon hearth and home to take up arms for causes that seem so remote from their daily interests? There is obviously a sense of participation in something grandiose: in a Salafi journal, the jihadis are described as “superheroes [who] defend the widows, the orphans, the oppressed, the forgotten, and the unjustly imprisoned.” Other attractions are the allure of risk-taking, the sense of high purpose and the comradeship that goes with it. Terrorism expert Scott Atran speaks of the lure of the “thrilling cause and call to action”, the promise of glory and the esteem of friends.

Some Western observers have opted for the “Alienation Theory”: Thomas Friedman has said somewhat glibly that “radical Islam gives a sense of community to humiliated, drifting young men, who have never held a job or a girl’s hand.” This just does not account for the high level of zeal and commitment that motivates jihad, the will to commit heinous acts of violence and the cheerful acceptance of martyrdom.

Recruitment

These come from the conviction that the individual is a part of a larger historic enterprise. As the Arab commentator, Faisal Al Yafai, has said, the jihadi “believes in a different conception of history” and is convinced that his “actions will have huge ramifications, far beyond their orbit of action”.

What does this bode for India? Both al Qaeda and the IS have devoted considerable recent attention to India: the IS is interested in expanding its recruitment base in the country, while al Qaeda has threatened to make India a zone of its operations. The IS is primarily interested in consolidating its territory in the Levant is not seeking to expand its operations elsewhere. Al Qaeda is of course competing with the IS for attention and membership.

Neither of them is likely to meet with any success in India. While Indian Muslims have had their fair share of grievances, they have invariably handled them within the confines of the national order, without seeking the support of external elements.

Again, the Muslim community showed no interest in jihadi activity either during the “global jihad” in Afghanistan or since then.

This was in spite of incidents in India such as the destruction of the Babri Masjid and, globally, dramatic jihadi actions such as the 9/11 attacks and the territorial expansion of al Qaeda since then. But, there is no room for complacency: we now have a new generation of Muslim youth who believe their community is being increasingly marginalised in national affairs, an increasing assertiveness on the part of sections of the majority community, and a perceived failure of the Indian state to enforce the law and provide justice. Grievance and victimhood are potent forces and have impelled individuals toward jihad in several communities.

Allure

Added to this is the romance and allure surrounding the Caliphate of the IS: its military victories; the large swathe of territories occupied by it in the heart of the Arab world, and the arms, financial resources and cadres available to it, all of these achievements are unique in recent jihadi experience. Social media carry its messages far and wide. They could strike a responsive chord in the heart of some in India who rejoice in the resurgence of Islam and would wish to be foot-soldiers in the historic narratives to be etched by their personal efforts.