Pakistan link exposed: Pahalgam terrorists' route traces back to LeT commander in Lahore

Indian agencies have traced the infiltration and movement of terrorists involved in the April 22 Pahalgam attack which has established a clear operational chain that leads back to Pakistan, CNN-News18 has reported quoting sources.

According to the report, investigators have identified a top Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) commander based in Lahore as the key handler of the terrorists.

The findings are part of a detailed dossier prepared after the July 28 counterterror operation ‘Operation Mahadev’, in which three terrorists — including the Pahalgam mastermind — were gunned down.

The trail points to Sajid Saifullah Jatt as the principal figure directing the dastardly attack. Jatt is reportedly LeT’s operational chief for south Kashmir.

Another individual, Rizwan Anees from Rawalkot in Pakistan-occupied Kashmir (PoK), coordinated funeral prayers in PoK for the slain terrorists.

All three attackers killed in the Dachigam-Harwan forest belt on July 28 were senior LeT operatives: Suleman Shah alias Faizal Jatt, Abu Hamza alias “Afghan”, and Yasir alias “Jibran”. Union home minister Amit Shah revealed the details of the operation along with the names of the terrorists during a debate on Operation Sindoor in Lok Sabha last week.

Investigators have also confirmed that none of the three terrorists were Indian nationals, the report said.

Security forces have also recovered significant evidence linking the attackers to Pakistan. Two of the terrorists were found carrying Pakistani voter ID cards, tied to electoral rolls in Lahore and Gujranwala. A damaged satellite phone yielded a micro-SD card with NADRA biometric data, confirming their Pakistani citizenship and addresses in Kasur and PoK. They also had chocolate wrappers, which were manufactured in Pakistan.

The CNN-News18 report said that lot numbers on the packaging were traced back to 2024 consignments shipped to Muzaffarabad.

Intercepted radio chatter from as far back as May 2022 showed that the terrorists infiltrated via the Gurez sector across the Line of Control. Local support was crucial — two men from Kashmir, Parvaiz and Bashir Ahmad Jothar, confessed to sheltering them in a temporary hut near Pahalgam, the report said.

Electronic evidence also played a key role. GPS data from a Garmin tracker and logs from a Huawei satellite phone confirmed their movements and communication with handlers in Pakistan.

Ballistics testing later matched AK-103 rifles recovered in the Dachigam encounter with shell casings from the Pahalgam attack site, further tightening the chain of evidence.

Officials are calling the evidence package the most conclusive to emerge from any cross-border terror investigation in recent years.

Five heavily armed terrorists killed 26 civilians, all male, in Pahalgam in one of the most dastardly attacks in J&K in recent years.