Clout waning, but Hizbul Mujahideen chief says he won't step down

ISLAMABAD/NEW DELHI: Hizbul Mujahideen boss Syed Salahuddin's clout within the terror outfit as well as with Pakistan's ISI was on the wane, Indian agencies claimed on Monday even as the terror chieftain denied any move to step down to pave the way for a new leader.

According to Indian agencies, Salahuddin, who was designated a "global terrorist" by the US in June last year, has been out of favour with the ISI for some time now. The Pakistani spy agency has reportedly sidelined him, scaled down funding to him and is not allowing him any fresh protest programmes in view of his inability to raise hardened terrorists, including suicide bombers.

The ISI instead has come to rely more on Lashkar-e-Taiba and Jaish-e-Mohammad to execute big terror strikes in J&K, and it is LeT chief Hafiz Mohammad Saeed who is really managing the proxy war in Kashmir.

An intelligence operative in New Delhi said that while Salahuddinhas been leading Hizbul Mujahideen, he may not really be the one in charge, with others taking on key roles in the largest Kashmiri militant outfit.

Amid reports that he may have already reconciled to a diminished role in Kashmir, Salahuddin on Monday denied any possibility of his stepping down and paving the way for others to take control of the terror organisation.

"This is fake news," said Salahuddin, 71, who also heads the United Jihad Council (UJC), a terrorist conglomerate. He claimed that "such myths were spread by Indian security agencies as part of their psychological operations".

In a telephonic conversation, UJC secretary general Sheikh Jamil-ur-Rehman told TOI that the news about Salahuddin's "possible retreat from the field was 200% concocted".