Mission Mumbai: Kasab was trained to kill to the last breath

New Delhi: In 1990, three-year-old Mohammed Ajmal Amir Kasab's mother hid in a windowless room, shielding her baby son, while shots rang out in the dark outside the family home in an impoverished and isolated village of Punjab.

Not even in the wildest dreams, Noor Illahi had thought that her son would one day become one of the dreaded terrorists of Lashkar-e-Taiba.

His village of Faridkot is quite impoverished and isolated, despite being close to a larger town, Depalpur. On the side of a building, just outside Faridkot, graffiti in large lettering says, in Urdu, "Go for jihad. Go for jihad. Markaz Dawat ul-Irshad". Markaz Dawat ul-Irshad is a parent organisation of Lashkar-e-Taiba.

Kasab left home after a fight with his father in 2005. He had asked for new clothes on Eid, but his father could not provide them, which made him angry. He then became involved in petty crime with his friend Muzaffar Lal Khan, soon moving on to armed robbery.

On December 21, 2007, Eid al-Adha, they were in Rawalpindi trying to buy weapons when they encountered members of Jama'at-ud-Da'wah, the political wing of Lashkar-e-Taiba, distributing pamphlets. After a brief chat, they decided to sign up for training, ending up at their base camp, Markaz Taiba.

Kasab is the only attacker captured alive by police during the 2008 Mumbai terror attacks and is currently in Indian custody. Zaki-ur-Rehman Lakhvi, a senior commander of the Lashkar-e-Taiba, reportedly offered to pay his family Rs 150,000 for his participation in the attacks. Another report said the 23-year-old was recruited from his home, in part, based on a pledge by recruiters to pay Rs 100,000 to his family when he became a martyr. Other sources put the reward to US $4,000.

The Government of Pakistan initially denied that Kasab was from Pakistan, but in January 2009, they officially accepted that he is a Pakistani citizen.

On May 3, 2010, an Indian court convicted him of murder, waging war on India, possessing explosives, and other charges. On May 6, 2010, the same trial court sentenced him to death on four counts and to a life sentence on five other counts.

Kasab has been sentenced to death for attacking Mumbai and killing 166 people on November 26, 2008. He was found guilty of 80 offences, including waging war against the nation, which is punishable by the death penalty. Kasab's death sentence was upheld by the Bombay High Court on February 21, 2011. The verdict was upheld by the Supreme Court on August 29, 2012.

Kasab was trained to "kill to the last breath"

Kasab is alleged to be among a group of 24 men, who received training in marine warfare at a remote camp in mountainous Muzaffarabad in Azad Kashmir, Pakistan. Part of the training is reported to have taken place on the Mangla Dam reservoir.

The batch of 26 went through the following stages of training:

Psychological: Indoctrination to Islamist propaganda, including compiled footage of Indian atrocities in Jammu & Kashmir, and imagery of atrocities suffered by Muslims in India, Chechnya, Palestine and across the globe.

Basic Combat: Lashkar's basic combat training and terror methodology course, the Daura Aam.

Advanced Training: Selected to undergo advanced combat training at a camp near Mansehra, a course the organisation calls the Daura Khaas. This includes advanced weapons and explosives training supervised by retired personnel of the Pakistan Army, along with survival training and further indoctrination.

Commando Training: Finally, an even smaller group selected for specialised commando tactics training and marine navigation training given to the Fedayeen unit selected in order to target Mumbai.

From the batch of 25, 10 were handpicked for the Mumbai mission. They also received training in swimming and sailing, besides the use of high-end weapons and explosives under the supervision of LeT commanders. According to a media report citing an unnamed former Defence Department Official of the US, the intelligence agencies of the US had determined that former officers from Pakistan's Army and Inter-Services Intelligence agency assisted actively and continuously in training. They were given blueprints of all the four targets – Taj Mahal Palace & Tower, Oberoi Trident hotel and Nariman House.

Kasab was captured on CCTV during his attacks at Chhatrapati Shivaji Terminus along with another terrorist, Ismail Khan. Kasab reportedly told the police that they wanted to replicate the Islamabad Marriott hotel attack, and reduce the Taj Hotel to rubble, replicating the 9/11 attacks in India.

Kasab and his accomplice Abu Dera Ismail Khan, 25, attacked the Chhatrapati Shivaji Terminus (formerly Victoria Terminus) railway station. They then moved on to attack a police vehicle (a white Toyota Qualis) at Cama Hospital, in which senior Mumbai police officers Maharashtra ATS Chief Hemant Karkare, encounter specialist Vijay Salaskar and Additional Commissioner of Mumbai Police Ashok Kamte were travelling.

After killing them in a gun battle and taking two constables hostage in the Qualis, Kasab and Ismail Khan drove towards Metro cinema. Kasab joked about the bulletproof vests worn by the police and killed one constable when his mobile phone rang. They fired some shots into a crowd gathered at Metro Cinema. They then drove towards Vidhan Bhavan where they fired a few more shots. Their vehicle had a tire puncture, so they stole a silver Škoda Laura and drove towards Girgaum Chowpatty.

The Škoda reached Chowpatty and halted 40 to 50 feet from the barricade. It then reversed and tried to make a U-turn. A shootout ensued and Ismail Khan was killed. Kasab lay motionless playing dead. Assistant sub-inspector Tukaram Omble, who was armed only with a lathi, was killed when the police charged the car. Omble took five bullets, but held on to Kasab's weapon, enabling his colleagues to capture him alive.