"Gifts from the Gulf" continued...

Together they committed several kidnappings for ransom and Aftab, under Thakur’s tutelage,
learnt all tricks of the trade, including spotting wealthy targets, studying their daily routine and
habits, acquiring safe houses for keeping prospective abductees, the art of negotiating for
ransom, safe methods of collecting and moving ransom money.

In July 1995, they came to Ashok Vihar in Delhi to collect extortion money of Rs. 2 lakhs from
Girish Arora, a businessman. The Delhi Police, alerted by Arora, laid a trap for the extortionists
and Dinesh Thakur was gunned down in a shootout with the police. For once, the mentor and his pupil had slipped up in their modus operandi and paid the price for it.

Aftab was arrested and lodged in Tihar Jail where he stayed from July 1995 to November 1998.
During this period Aftab came in touch with several co-inmates involved in cases of terror.
Talking to them for hours, he was exposed to jehadi ideology and came under its overpowering
and indelible influence on him. Interactions with jehadi fellow-inmates in jail converted a
gangster gradually into an Islamist.

Amongst the people he met in jail were Kashmiri militants, each with his own woeful tale of the
militant struggle in the valley. He also became intimate with one Asif Raza Khan, a young
criminal turned hard-core militant from Kolkata, who was linked to Hizb-ul-Mujahideen, a
dreaded terrorist outfit. Asif was doing time in a case of Police Station Adarsh Nagar of Delhi in
a 1994 case under Terrorist and Disruptive Activities (Prevention) Act and Explosive Substances Act. Aftab and Asif became close friends and their friendship was to last for several years after their release from jail.

To be continued...