Pak paper Dawn establishes Faridkot link to Mumbai terror attack

Karachi, Dec.12 (ANI): Pakistan's Dawn newspaper has confirmed that there is a link between Faridkot in Punjab province and the terror attacks that were launched on Mumbai last month.

In a special report, the Dawn says that the targeting of the Lashkar-e-Taiba and the Jamaatud Dawa and the rounding up of the activists belonging to the two jihadi organisations appear to have been triggered by information originating in India.

The Dawn says that through it's own investigations last week, it could locate a family who claimed to be the kin of Ajmal Kasab, the sole survivor among the 10 attackers.

It says that media organizations such as the BBC and now the British newspaper Observer have done reports trying to ascertain the veracity of claims appearing in the media that the young man had a home there.

Even though the news stories by both BBC and the Observer made a mention of the LeT, some television channels in Pakistan suggested that a connection between Mumbai and Faridkot could not be established beyond a shadow of doubt.

However, the man who said he was Amir Kasab confirmed to Dawn that the young man whose face had been beamed over the media was his son.

"I was in denial for the first couple of days, saying to myself it could not have been my son," he told Dawn in the courtyard of his house in Faridkot, a village of about 2,500 people just a few kilometres from Deepalpur on the way to Kasur. "Now I have accepted it.

"This is the truth. I have seen the picture in the newspaper. This is my son Ajmal."

Variously addressed as Azam, Iman, Kamal and Kasav, the young man, apparently in his 20s, is being kept in custody at an undisclosed place in Mumbai.

After his brush with crime and criminals in Lahore, he is said to have run into and joined a religious group during a visit to Rawalpindi.

Along with others, claimed the Indian media, he was trained in fighting. And after a crash course in navigation, said Amir Kasab, a father of three sons and two daughters, Ajmal disappeared from home four years ago.

"He had asked me for new clothes on Eid that I couldn't provide him. He got angry and left."

Amir Kasab said he had settled in Faridkot after arriving from the nearby Haveli Lakha many years ago. He owned the house and made his earnings by selling pakoras in the streets of the village.

He modestly pointed to a hand-cart in one corner of the courtyard. "This is all I have. I shifted back to the village after doing the same job in Lahore.

Kasab, a mild-mannered soul, is a bit agitated at the mention of the link between his son's actions and money.

"I don't sell my sons," he retorts. (ANI)