Similarities seen between Indian Airlines, U.S. hijackings

By Satinder Bindra
CNN New Delhi Bureau Chief

NEW DELHI, India (CNN) -- Indian investigators say techniques employed in the September 11 hijacking attacks in the United States bear a striking similarity to those used in a 1999 hijacking in South Asia -- which the Indian government insists was executed by members of al Qaeda.

"The demands they made and the people whose release they demanded ... were definitely linked with al Qaeda, (and) I would like to think even the hijackers were linked with this terrorist organization," says Indian government spokesman Nirupama Rao.

In 1999, an Indian Airlines Airbus with 178 passengers and crew was hijacked while flying from Katmandu, Nepal, to New Delhi, India.

The captain of the hijacked plane, Devi Sharan, was told to fly to Pakistan, then Dubai, then finally, Kandahar, Afghanistan. The ordeal lasted eight days. He says the hijackers used the public address system to praise suspected terrorist ringleader Osama bin Laden, who is believed to head al Qaeda.

"They used (it) to praise Osama bin Laden and they used (it) to give lots of lectures on Islam," Sharan said. The United States wants Afghanistan to turn over bin Laden, where he is believed to be living. U.S. authorities consider him the prime suspect behind terror attacks in which four airliners were hijacked: Two of them slammed into the World Trade Center towers in New York; one crashed into the Pentagon, and one crash-landed in Pennsylvania, killing thousands.

Sharan said the hijackers always referred to bin Laden as a good man and a philanthropist.

He recalled that after he was forced to land in Kandahar, the hijackers appeared to relax and did not seem to be intimidated by the Taliban fighters who surrounded the plane.

Once on Afghan soil, the five hijackers demanded India release three jailed Islamic militants.

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One of them, Maulana Masood Azhar, was being held by Indian authorities in connection with activities in Kashmir. India says he was a prominent member of a group the United States regards as a terrorist organization.

"He was a known constituent member of the Harkat-ul-Mujahedeen, which as you may be aware is a part of al Qaeda," Sharan said.

India released Azhar and the two others demanded by the hijackers and almost immediately the plane's passengers and crew were let go.

Maximizing fear

Two years later, Indian investigators and Sharan say the techniques used by the Indian Airlines hijackers show certain similarities to techniques apparently used in the United States.

"They have crashed the plane there also. In our case, also, they were ready to die and crash the plane anytime," Sharan said.

The hijackers of the U.S. flights, investigative sources say, carried box cutters. Sharan said the hijackers used knives on his plane, targeting three passengers -- killing one -- to take control of the plane.

"His hands were tied . . . on his seat and his throat was slit . . . the jugular vein was cut," the pilot said.

All this took place in front of the other passengers, with maximizing fear the objective, he said.

During the U.S. hijackings, passengers speaking on cell phones described how they were herded to the rear of the aircraft. Sharan says the same thing happened on his plane. "In our case, people were pushed into economy class and executive class was totally empty. There was lot of struggling going on. They were pushing the people back."

Knowledge of aviation

He said the hijackers were well-schooled in avionics, fuel loads, maps and navigation. One of the hijackers said he'd been trained on a flight simulator.

"He was a trained person in the simulator, and the way he was acting in the cockpit I could see that he knew that I could not make him a fool," Sharan said.

A former police chief and consultant on terrorism in India also believes the Indian and U.S. hijackings are similar.

"We believe in the good old modus operandi that if you use a method and it is successful you tend to use it again," says K.P.S. Gill.

Gill says it appears both sets of hijackers had similar training and may have shared techniques.

"The experience of Kandahar came in very handy to plan and train these people in the U.S.A. Captain Sharan says he's not sure who trained the men who took over his plane. But he is sure what happened to him. And his plane may help U.S. investigators figure out who was behind the world's worst terrorist attack," Gill said.