Why Narendra Modi's biggest security threat is still Pakistan's ISI

This is the most crucial question for Narendra Modi’s security and strategic top brass today: who is India’s deadliest external enemy?

I asked this question to a top security honcho on Sunday evening who chose to answer the question on an anonymous basis. I helped with three names: Dawood Ibrahim, Hafiz Saeed and Syed Salahuddin.

His answer: none of the above.

I persisted with the question and the monosyllabic answer I got was this: ISI.

The answer may well be redux to olden times when Pakistan’s secret service Inter Services Intelligence (ISI) reigned supreme in the Indian security mindset.

After all, the ISI has tormented India for decades but its charisma has waned over the years. This may be because of the increased diplomatic and economic weight of India in the international scheme of things, particularly in the Indian subcontinent.

Isn’t it true that India is currently a $1.8 trillion economy whereas Pakistan’s GDP, according to the CIA World Factbook, is still at an unimpressive $236 billion?

Or in simpler terms, is it not a fact that while Pakistan is fighting to keep itself as afloat as a nation and prevent its economy from a looming crash, India’s struggle is not a survivalist one but one focused on finding its own place in the sun?

Or, take another arithmetic calculation with regard to Pakistan’s export of terrorism. A quarter century ago, the cost for Pakistan to ‘export’ a terrorist into India was twenty thousand rupees apiece, as told to me by a key figure in the Indian security establishment at that time.

Given the inflation, the same cost must have zoomed and multiplied manifold, perhaps reaching the million mark, if not breaching it.

Now the question is: can Pakistan’s fragile economy continue to export its most favoured product – terrorism – to India with the same intensity? Obviously not!

This should explain the real reasons behind the lull in Pakistan’s terror export to India. No doubt, India’s counter-terrorism measures, which have increasingly thrived on latest gadgetry and equipment with the help of friends like Israel, have contributed to stemming this menace. There has been a better and more qualitative degree of intelligence as well, though gaping loopholes remain.

Moreover, Pakistan, true to the style of a Frankenstein monster, is increasingly getting consumed by its own creation. The bombs that were meant to explode in India are exploding in Pakistani cities instead.

The proxy war that Pakistan had unleashed against India three decades ago has turned inward.

But the fact is that Pakistani terror machine has been kept in check largely because of the economic conditions of the two South Asian neighbours. Therefore, it won’t be wrong to pinpoint the reasons of India’s relative ease on the terror front. It’s the economy, stupid!

Now, coming back to the question with which this article started off: who is India’s deadliest external enemy?

The senior Indian official helped by elaborating that though there may be longer-term security threats to India – like China, of course – the ISI threat can hardly be put on the back burner.

Already there are reports how the ISI is waiting in the wings to hit back at India with vengeance. If this were to happen, obviously it would be with a very high degree of deniability quotient. It will be a scenario wherein India would not be able to point its finger to the ISI in the event of future terror attacks or destabilization acts, but would be left in no doubt who is behind it.

One such fertile field for the ISI is its old and favourite target: the Indian Punjab. The problems of narcotics and alcohol have surfaced in Punjab in a big way. The state government has done precious little about the twin problems. Instead, there are allegations that people wielding enormous influence with the state government are in cahoots with drug peddlers and bootleggers.

The Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) put these social evils on top of their agenda in the just-concluded general elections. If AAP has come up with a stunning performance, winning four out of 13 Lok Sabha seats in Punjab and emerged as the third political force in the state, it is only because it raised those issues that affect virtually every second or third household in Punjab directly.

Indeed, there are intelligence inputs that the ISI would be trying to play on this Indian fault line in Punjab and would be doing its utmost to open the cracks further.

As for individuals like Dawood Ibrahim Hafiz Saeed and Salahuddin, the official observed that the employer would get as many worthy employees as long as it throws money to them. The first and the third in this list, Dawood and Salahuddin, may fall in that category of mercenaries.

But Hafiz Saeed is a different kettle of fish. He is an ideologue and has been acting as the fountainhead of India-centric terror outfits based in Pakistan, driven by the petrol of ideology.

Thus, Hafiz Saeed is the most potent threat for India from among all Pakistan-based terrorists.

Prime Minister Modi will have to find ways to deal with this most potent enemy. He is no longer a snake in the grass. Hafiz Saeed has declared jihad against India just a few days ago – and that too openly at a gathering of about ten thousand people in Pakistan.

The question is: how Modi’s high-profile National Security Advisor Ajit Doval will deal with fountainheads of India-centric terror based in Pakistan?

The writer is a Firstpost columnist and a strategic analyst who tweets @Kishkindha.