Nearly six years ago, I was face to face with Maulvi Masood Azhar the Harkat-ul-Ansar leader, whose release is being sought by the hijackers of the Indian Airlines (IA) flight.On a spring day, journalists were asked to rush to Srinagar's Badami Bagh cantonment for ``presentation'' of a ``major catch' by the forces. But Azhar was somewhat of a disappointment for the mediapersons. Clad in a salwar-kameez, the barely five-feet-plus man with a stocky build seemed like the man next door, lacking both the charisma of a religious preacher or the macho image of a ``mujahid''. Army officers asserted that Azhar was putting on a facade. In their briefings, they tried to convince us that Azhar was a prize catch and that his arrest would upset the applecart of organisations which were behind the insurgency in Kashmir. During these briefings, Azhar remained calm and despite many provocations, never changed his tone.Azhar and his rather flamboyant companion, Sajjad Afghani, were arrested quite effortlessly by theforces in Srinagar when the duo were boarding a three-wheeler. Both were dressed as Kashmiris. The troops had got suspicious after Sajjad, a Punjabi-speaking youth, panicked at the sight of a patrol party of security forces.The duo were reportedly carrying Indian currency amounting to nearly Rs 5 lakhs. But, speaking to journalists, Azhar maintained that he was a simple cleric who had come to Kashmir to preach religion. Contradicting him, his interrogators swore that he was the top-most man in the militants' hierarchy an ideologue and ace organiser who had come to Kashmir to establish the Harkat-ul-Ansar network and liase with the plethora of Kashmiri insurgent groups. Azhar's arrest came at a time when the foreign mercenaries had just started making their presence felt in Kashmir. Although the government had dismissed the detection of foreigners among the Kashmiri militants as a mere ``fancy fad'', Azhar's arrest jolted the security forces out of their complacency.Azhar's interrogators were puzzled byhis cool countenance. He reportedly did not carry any firearms with him. His passport turned out to be fake but Azhar maintained that it was ``not my fault''.Seeing the person, one was inclined not to believe the security forces' version about Azhar. Shortly before his arrest, the Army had captured two hardcore Harkat-ul-Ansar fighters from the hills in South Kashmir. One of them, known as Langryal a Afghan veteran whose face had reportedly been scarred by the injuries in the Afghanistan war announced that he would not speak to ``bibis'' the women journalist in order to retain his faith. He had unilaterally declared himself a ``prisoner of war''. Even the Army troops who had captured him accorded him the respect due to a soldier.After this experience, Azhar seemed like a decent man with a moderate approach to life and other issues. Some journalists even suspected the veracity of the Army's statements. ``After all the Army is free to accuse Pakistan nationals of anything,'' a senior Kashmiriseparatist leader had told The Indian Express then.However, later when during informal chats the militants' public relations officers confessed of the ``major loss'' to the (freedom) ``movement'', I was convinced of Azhar's importance. One such PRO had even told me that ``Pakistanis would do anything to secure the Maulvi's release''.While I thought Langryal was more important to them, I was corrected. ``No he is a spent force, they can spare him,'' was what I was told. And the words have proved prophetic. Azhar's release was on the Harkat-ul-Ansar's agenda, when they abducted six western tourists in South Kashmir four years back. They killed one of them, while another escaped safely. The fate of the remaining four hostages remains unknown as the Indian government refused to release Azhar and another Pakistani in exchange of the hostages.
