Article
Terror Financing in Kashmir

By : Abhinav Pandya

Page No: 382-399

Abstract
This paper is an analysis of terror financing in Jammu and Kashmir based on the author’s research and fieldwork in the past five years in this sensitive border State. To sustain and fund its proxy war in Kashmir valley, over the last three decades, Pakistan has created a complex, multi-layered and networked terror financing system with distinct characteristics not obtained in the other conflict theatres. The novel features of raising money include illegal funds raised from allocating medical, engineering, and other higher education seats in Pakistan and other countries, Haj tours and travels, LoC cross-border trade, and Jamaat-i-Islami funding networks. Separatist and extremist entities, including the officers and politicians with dubious loyalties and the separatist media, also raise money through local State government sources. Terror funding is utilized for various ends like running terrorist organizations, extremist religious entities, separatist media, stone-pelting, funding Hurriyat and mainstream political parties, and funding social media and intellectual narratives. India’s counter-terror financing efforts received a fillip with the formation of National Investigation Agency (NIA) in 2009. Over the last five years, NIA has launched a massive crackdown on terror funding which has given a significant blow to Pakistan’s three-decade-old investment.

Author :
Abhinav Pandya is the founder and CEO of Usanas Foundation, a security and foreign policy think-tank, and the author of Radicalisation in India: An Exploration, Pentagon, 2019.