Azam Cheema (, 1953 – 28 February 2024), also known as Baba or Babaji, was a Pakistani Lashkar-e-Taiba operative who was the mastermind of the 2008 Mumbai attacks and the 11 July 2006 Mumbai train bombings. In November 2010, the United States Department of the Treasury announced sanctions against him just before Barack Obama's visit to India. A citizen of Pakistan, he was described as the intelligence chief of the Lashkar-e-Taiba and was specifically involved in teaching operatives bomb making and infiltrating India.
Cheema was born at Faisalabad in 1953. He was sanctioned as a Specially Designated Global Terrorist under the Specially Designated Nationals and Blocked Persons List by the Office of Foreign Assets Control; where his addresses are listed in Islamabad, Muzaffarabad and Bahawalpur. Cheema, aged 70, died from a heart attack in Pakistan on 28 February 2024.
Early life and career
Born in 1953 in a lower middle class Punjabi Muslim family, Cheema eventually became a teacher of Islamic studies at the Government Municipal Degree College, Faisalabad. While teaching there in the 1980s, Cheema joined a circle of Islamist professors from the University of Engineering and Technology, Lahore who were involved with the Ahl-i Hadith movement. The members of this group were Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) founder and commander Hafiz Saeed, Abdul Rehman Makki and Zafar Iqbal. According to analyst Stephen Tankel of the National Defence College, Cheema was stationed in India from 1991 to 1992, and assisted the creation of the LeT's networks in the country.
Investigations by the Mumbai Police revealed Cheema knew Osama bin Laden and other Al-Qaeda commanders. It is said Cheema was pivotal in transporting Al-Qaeda logistics commander Abu Zubaydah to a Faisalabad safehouse in March 2002, on behalf of the Pakistani external intelligence agency, the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI). In 2016, an Indian public prosecutor claimed Cheema was a retired ISI agent hailing from Sialkot. Cheema was known to have great expertise in reading maps, and also fought in the Soviet–Afghan War, though there is little information about his activities in the war. After the demolition of the Babri Masjid in 1992, Saeed charged Cheema with creating a new front in mainland India which had different objectives than those in Kashmir.
Cheema's role in the LeT was managing operations in India, excluding Kashmir. He led a distinct unit for these operations and only communicated with its members. Although he was not the LeT commander for Kashmir, Cheema was nevertheless an eminent figure in its operations there and attended multiple public memorials for LeT operatives who died there and elsewhere in India. Cheema was described as the intelligence chief of the Lashkar-e-Taiba and specifically involved in teaching operatives bomb making. He also worked on infiltrating terrorists into India, establishing militant training camps and supplying arms. Saeed, Cheema, Abdul Rehman Makki, Zafar Iqbal, Abdul Salam Bhuttavi, and other senior LeT commanders had the right to offer funeral prayers for killed militants. They were also closely involved in choosing or approving the militants sent to Kashmir or other parts of India.
Dasta Mohammad Bin Qasim Indian agencies learned about Cheema for the first time in 1998 while investigating terrorists planning to attack Delhi. They discovered the multiple attacks Cheema was planning along with his LeT senior Zakiur Rehman Lakhvi, and Indian LeT commander Syed Abdul Karim Tunda. From 1997 to 1998, these three terrorists commanded the LeT's "Dasta Mohammad Bin Qasim" unit, which executed attacks in North India. At the Chelabandi LeT base in Muzaffarabad, Tunda met Cheema, Abu Dujana and Abdul Qadir, and learnt the process of making improvised explosive devices (IEDs) from them. The unit was mostly composed of Tanzim Islahul Muslimeen leaders, including Tunda, Jalees Ansari and Azam Ghauri. On the first anniversary of the Babri Masjid demolition in 1993, the unit set off multiple blasts in trains at Hyderabad, Indergarh, Surat, Lucknow and Gulbarga.
Sometime after 1995, Tunda was tasked with infiltrating LeT operatives into India through Bangladesh. Cheema initially gave him ₹25 to ₹30 lakhs for this purpose. However, Tunda said Cheema double-crossed him by creating his own group in India led by Saleem Junaid, and stopped giving him money. Tunda also said Cheema was excluded from LeT activities after Junaid was arrested and revealed the details of all LeT members in India.
Ansari was arrested while planning another round of bombings for the 1994 Republic Day events, and Ghauri escaped to Pakistan via Saudi Arabia. Tunda fled to Dhaka, and recruited the unit's field agents, assisted by the Bangladesh Islami Chhatra Shibir. On 7 March 2009, Abu Taher was arrested at Sealdah railway station in Kolkata. Taher was a close associate of Cheema and Tunda. Taher, along with Tunda and Ansari, carried out 40 blasts in North Indian cities from December 1996 to January 1997. 21 of these blasts occurred in Delhi, with the rest in Mumbai, Hyderabad, Panipat, Sonipat, Ludhiana, Kanpur and Varanasi. Ghauri arrived in India in 1998 and effected seven bombings, five in Hyderabad and two in nearby Matpalli (Raichur) and Nanded.
Cheema succeeded Lakhvi as the LeT commander of India operations. Cheema sent money to Saleem Junaid, an LeT agent in Hyderabad, who bought a Mitsubishi Fuso Canter light truck and used it for the business he set up as a cover cover. Among other things, the truck was used to transport RDX to Dehradun in July 1997, which was later placed on a military coach in a train going to Delhi. Other than Junaid, Cheema's Indian agents were Abdul Sattar, who created a terror module in Khurja; and Amir Khan, whose module had members in the states of Maharashtra, Uttar Pradesh and Haryana and the Indian capital Delhi. Junaid, Sattar and Khan were arrested between 1997 and 1998. Sattar was working on planting bombs in military vehicles and at Delhi Cantonment. He had requisitioned of RDX and other weapons from Cheema, which didn't arrive because Junaid was arrested.
In November 2002, LeT member Mohammad Azam was arrested in Hyderabad. In order to set off religious violence, Azam plotted to murder Hindu nationalists, including B. Narayana Reddy of Gaddiannaram, Ajay Kumar of Saidabad and, most notably, businessman and Vishva Hindu Parishad (VHP) leader G. Pulla Reddy. Azam was in touch with LeT commanders Tunda, Cheema and Fahadullah, who also sent him explosives. Also in November 2002, two men suspected to be Pakistani, aged 20 and 25, were killed after they attacked the Ansal Plaza mall in Delhi. The Delhi Police said they were constantly talking to Cheema during the attack by using satellite phones.
Activities in Gujarat According to Indian police officer D. G. Vanzara, Cheema executed almost all the terror attacks in Gujarat after the 2002 Gujarat violence. Vanzara said Cheema was involved in terror since 1995 and his associate Abu Amjad was killed in a police encounter in 1998. Vanzara also said Cheema executed the 2006 Ahmedabad railway station bombing and created an LeT cell in Aurangabad with the intent to attack Gujarat. Cheema was also listed as a suspect in the 2007 Samjhauta Express bombings. Abu Qasam, who claimed to be a member of Cheema's unit, confessed he was planning to murder L. K. Advani, the Home Minister, and Keshubhai Patel, the Chief Minister of Gujarat. Qasam said he infiltrated into India at the India–Pakistan border in Jaisalmer, with assistance from the Pakistan Rangers.
Cooperation with other groups In July 2001, LeT militant Muzammil (also known as Shahnawaz Hussain Bhatti) was arrested by the Border Security Force near Hajipir in Kutch. He helped Indian police retrieve of RDX and other weapons hidden in the Rann of Kutch, and said he received them from Cheema. Police believe Bhatti trained in Pakistan in January 1993, and at the same time met Cheema and Aftab Ansari of the LeT and Ahmed Omar Saeed Sheikh of the Jaish-e-Mohammed (JeM). Police also speculate Cheema planned to smuggle arms and infiltrate members of a Kolkata module of the JeM through the India–Pakistan border in Gujarat. Bhatti, who was serving a life sentence pronounced in 2007, was imprisoned at Sabarmati Central Jail along with four other Pakistanis. The group were planning a jailbreak with assistance from Cheema's unit based in Sindh.
According to Indian intelligence agencies, LeT and the Khalistani organization Babbar Khalsa started cooperating in 2008 and had nearly 12 shared camps in Pakistan. These camps, located in Rawalpindi District and Karachi District, provided training to make IEDs and launch grenade attacks. Cheema allegedly supervised these camps, and managed their financing and recruitment. The ISI reportedly assisted the training operations at these camps. After his arrest, Tunda told police Cheema, Saeed; Wadhwa Singh and Ratandeep Singh of the Babbar Khalsa, and Dawood Ibrahim of the D-Company lived and closely cooperated in Karachi. Tunda further confessed to a failed attempt to bomb the 2010 Commonwealth Games in Delhi, planned along with the Babbar Khalsa.
Cheema, along with Asif Raza Khan and Ahmed Omar Saeed Sheikh of the JeM, created a terrorist module operating inside the Harkat-ul-Jihad al-Islami. The module planned to kidnap Indian cricketers Sachin Tendulkar and Sourav Ganguly for ransom, kill Indian president A. P. J. Abdul Kalam when he visited Patna in 2001, and also plant bombs at the Bhabha Atomic Research Centre (BARC) in Mumbai. The members of the module were arrested in the first three months of 2001. LeT western India commander Faisal Shaikh was also involved in the plot to bomb BARC, according to his confession. Faisal said he received orders from Cheema to reconnoiter the BARC facility and its security to locate gaps which could be exploited for an attack.
2001 Partha Roy Burman kidnapping
In July 2001, Partha Roy Burman, the chairman of Indian footwear company Khadim's, was kidnapped and released only after his ransom was paid. The kidnapping was executed by Dubai-based gangster Aftab Ansari, assisted by Asif Raza Khan of the Students' Islamic Movement of India (SIMI). In turn, Khan solicited help from Cheema and Ahmed Omar Saeed Sheikh after meeting them in Karachi. They struck a deal to supply the arms and ammunition, and Ansari in turn would pay them a fixed share of the ransom. Sheikh received his share of the 4 crore ransom (); and sent part of it to Mohamed Atta, who was one of the hijackers in the September 11 attacks. Ashaddudin (alias Shaukat), imprisoned for his role in the kidnapping, was lodged at Alipore Central Jail in Kolkata, and there met Abdul Subhan Qureshi, the LeT commander for northern India. Colluding with Cheema and the Indian Mujahideen's founder, they were planning to bomb Delhi before the Delhi Police arrested Qureshi.
Activities from 2004 to 2005
Cheema's protégé Faisal Shaikh reportedly confessed to planning the assassination attempt on Narendra Modi, the Chief Minister of Gujarat and later the Prime Minister of India. Faisal said he did so based on orders issued by Cheema. On 16 November 2004, four of the assassins sent by Faisal, including Ishrat Jahan, were killed by the Ahmedabad Police. Faisal attempted to secure aid for Jahan's family, and personally dispatched Ehtesham Siddiqui with money for the family. Faisal and Cheema also established three terror cells in the cities of Nashik and Nagpur in Maharashtra, which were busted after the 2006 Mumbai bombings. The LeT reportedly created these cells after the growth of Hindu organizations in the region led by Pragya Singh Thakur and Shrikant Purohit. The cells in the two cities were commanded by Cheema and Riyaz Bhatkal of the Indian Mujahideen.
2005 IISc shooting