Headley was in Pakistan control room during Mumbai siege

NEW DELHI: David Coleman Headley was in all probability seated right next to the Pakistani handlers of the 10 Mumbai attackers as they guided the latter through the siege at Taj, Oberoi and Nariman House during the 26/11 strikes, according to sources in the security establishment.

Though Headley did not speak to the terrorists in Mumbai directly, sources indicated that he was very much present in the LeT’s control room in Karachi, helping masterminds like Zaki ur Rehman Lakhvi and Zarar Shah fill up the attackers on the slightest logistical detail of the attack sites for a tactical advantage over the NSG counter-forces.

The FBI, through its team that recently paid a visit here, has confirmed that Headley was in regular touch with Zaki ur Rehman Lakhvi, besides Sajid Mir and Abdul Rehman Rashid Syed, and had even come across LeT founder and Jamaat ud Dawa chief Hafiz Mohammed Saeed at one of his training sessions with the outfit in Pakistan. He is said to have been greatly influenced by Hafiz Saeed’s discourses and even wanted to go to Kashmir for jehad. However, Lakhvi advised Headley against this, saying that he was too old to be a fighter in Kashmir and would rather use his Caucasian looks to carry out reconnaissance of targets in India without raising suspicion.

With FBI now confirming that Headley was in touch with Lakhvi, the NIA has sought the voice tapes of their conversations to match the same with the intercepts of the conversations between the 26/11 attackers and their Pakistan-based handlers. This would help nail Lakhvi as the key strategist behind the Mumbai strikes.
Though India has, in its set of dossiers to Pakistan on the 26/11 probe, sought the voice samples of Lakhvi, the authorities in Islamabad are yet to heed the request.

During the FBI team’s visit here, India also sought the US agency’s help to get Pakistan to question the 26/11 accused arrested on its soil to confirm Headley’s presence in the LeT control room at Karachi during the Mumbai mayhem.

Headley, the agencies here suspect, was working as an undercover agent for the US agencies to keep track of the drugs trafficking trade through Pakistan and Afghanistan, only to later turn rogue in 2005.

The suspicion that Headley was a US double agent is only confirmed by the ease with which he could travel in and out of Pakistan, despite the strict checks mounted by the US post-9/11 and the sudden change of his name from Daood Gilani to the Christian-sounding ‘Headley’ in 2005.

Working full time since 2005-06 on LeT’s terror plans for India, Headley visited the country 8 times ahead of 26/11, conducting recce of Nariman House, Taj Mahal hotel, Lepold Cafe, Chatrapati Shivaji Terminus and Oberoi-Trident hotels.

He had surveyed Nariman House and even gained entry inside posing as a Jew. NIA has recorded statements of witnesses who had either seen or accompanied Headley to Nariman House.

Headley had stayed at the Oberoi for four days in April last year despite staying as a paying guest in Mumbai and before that in Taj Mahal. He had later left India reportedly for Pakistan through a Gulf country.