India strikes Muridke Markaz linked to 26/11 attacks

The nine targets neutralised by the Indian armed forces in Operation Sindoor included Markaz Taiba Muridke, the Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) nerve centre infamous for imparting religious indoctrination and military-style training including to Mohammed Ajmal Amir Kasab and David Coleman Headley, the terrorists responsible for the November 2008 attacks in Mumbai. The targets also included the main centres of Jaish-e-Mohammad (JeM), in Bahawalpur and Muzaffarabad, whose de facto chief Maulana Masood Azhar is considered the mastermind of the Mumbai terrorist attacks.

“The targets were strategically selected and aimed to break down the main centres of terror groups operating freely in Pakistan,” a senior government official told ET on condition of anonymity. “These camps and centres have been active for the last three decades, acting as terror factories... neutralising them will help break its backbone.”

Colonel Sofiya Qureshi said at the official press briefing that the strike undertaken through precision capability, using niche technology weapons, targeted the terror infrastructure systematically built by Pakistan over the past three decades. “It is a complex web of recruitment and indoctrination centres, training areas for initial and refresher courses and launch pads with handlers. These camps are located both in Pakistan and Pakistan-occupied Jammu and Kashmir (POJK),” she said.


Markaz Taiba Muridke, located about 25 kilometres from the international boundary, served as the headquarters of the LeT, led by Hafiz Saeed. It also received funding from Osama bin Laden. The activities conducted here were first detailed by Kasab during the course of his interrogation. Kasab, who was captured alive during the 2008 Mumbai attacks, confessed to having received training at Muridke.

The Markaz also hosted other key accused of Mumbai attacks, including Headley and Tahawwur Rana, who helped orchestrate the attacks. They visited the site under instructions from LeT’s military chief, Zaki-ur-Rehman Lakhvi, with logistical assistance from Abdul Rehman Sayed, also known as Pasha, and others. Rana is currently in the custody of the National Investigation Agency for his role in the attacks.

Operation Sindoor’s another link to the Mumbai attacks is Markaz Subhan Allah, the headquarters and training facility of JeM located at the Karachi-Torkham highway in Bahawalpur in Pakistan’s Punjab province. Besides being the residence of important JeM functionaries, including the de facto chief Azhar’s family members, it housed more than 600 cadres. Spread over 15 acres, it served as the training and indoctrination centre. The centre is suspected to have been built with the help of both the provincial and federal governments of Pakistan, apart from funds raised from the Gulf, African and other countries.

The Indian armed forces also targeted Syedna Bilal Markaz, JeM centre in POKJ that acted as a transit point for operatives ahead of their infiltration into Jammu and Kashmir. JeM was listed as a terrorist organisation by the United Nations in October 2001 and its chief, Azhar, was listed as an international terrorist by the UN Security Council in May 2019.