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| Ahead of FATF meet, Pakistan hikes bounty on Masood Azhar in desperate optics play | | |  Early Times Report
Jammu, Sept 14: With the Financial Action Task Force's (FATF) next review just weeks away, Pakistan has pulled out a familiar trick — dressing up old theatre as new resolve. Islamabad has added Pulwama mastermind Masood Azhar to its so-called "Red Book," the official list of most-wanted fugitives, and raised the bounty on his head from Pakistani Rupees 5 million to 7 million.
There's just one problem: Azhar isn't a fugitive at all. He is widely believed to be living openly inside Pakistan, protected — according to persistent allegations — by the very state apparatus now claiming to hunt him. Seen against that backdrop, the bounty hike looks less like a crackdown on terror and more like a calculated bid to sway the FATF before it sits down to deliberate.
The FATF's next plenary is scheduled for October 26–30, 2026, in Paris, and Pakistan is pulling every lever available to avoid being pushed back onto the grey list. The stakes are existential: an economy already teetering on the edge of default could unravel further if the grey-list tag returns.
The desperation makes sense. Pakistan received a financial assistance package worth roughly Rs 11,322 crore (in Indian currency terms) from the International Monetary Fund (IMF) this past May, and its external debt currently stands at nearly Rs 4.92 lakh crore. To keep the FATF off its back, Islamabad needs to visibly demonstrate action against terror financing and terrorist networks — hence, seemingly, the sudden interest in "finding" Azhar.
The United States has designated both Jaish-e-Mohammed and Azhar as terrorists, adding to the pressure o There’s just one problem: Azhar isn’t a fugitive at all. He is widely believed to be living openly inside Pakistan.
He is being protected by the very state apparatus now claiming to hunt him.
The bounty hike looks less like a crackdown on terror and more like a calculated bid to sway the FATF before it sits down to deliberate.
The FATF’s next plenary is scheduled for October 26–30, 2026, in Paris, and Pakistan is pulling every lever available to avoid being pushed back onto the grey list.
Since 2021, Pakistan has repeatedly asserted Azhar is not within its borders while keeping a nominal Rs 5 million bounty on him.
That figure has now simply been bumped up to Rs 7 million — a paper increase that raises an obvious question: if Pakistan genuinely wants him caught, how does his organisation's network keep operating freely across the country?
Former terrorists once linked to Jaish-e-Mohammed's network — now reintegrated into mainstream life — tell a different story. According to them, Azhar may avoid public appearances, but both he and his organisation continue to enjoy full protection from Pakistan's government and military. They say the state and army have actively helped Jaish rebuild the infrastructure that was destroyed during Operation Sindoor.
Markaz Subhanallah, Jaish's key headquarters in Bahawalpur, Punjab, has reportedly undergone large-scale reconstruction, with the Pakistani government funnelling roughly Rs 250 million in instalments toward the rebuild.
Jaish has also reportedly shifted its training camps deeper into Pakistan's interior — with recruitment drives and rallies surfacing in Bahawalpur, Multan, Sialkot, Karachi, Muzaffarabad, Kotli, Haripur, and Mansehra. Azhar himself has reportedly addressed several of these gatherings by phone. To dodge international financial sanctions, Jaish has also rebranded its Pakistan operations under the name "Al-Murabitoon." |
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