1971 Indian Airlines hijacking
| Hijacking summary | |
|---|---|
| Date | 30 January 1971 |
| Summary | Aircraft hijacking |
| Site | Lahore, Pakistan |
| Survivors | All |
| Aircraft type | Fokker F27 Friendship |
| Aircraft name | Ganga |
| Operator | Indian Airlines |
On 30 January 1971 an Indian Airlines Fokker F27 Friendship aircraft named Ganga flying from Srinagar to Jammu was hijacked by two Kashmiri separatists belonging to the National Liberation Front (the antecedent of Jammu and Kashmir Liberation Front), Hashim Qureshi and his cousin Ashraf Qureshi. It was flown to Lahore, Pakistan where the passengers and crew were released and the aircraft was burnt on 1 February 1971.
Ganga was one of the oldest aircraft in the Indian Airlines fleet and was already withdrawn from service but was re-inducted days before the hijacking.
India retaliated to the hijacking and subsequent burning of the aircraft by banning overflights by Pakistani aircraft. This overflight ban in the run up to the December 1971 war between the countries had a significant impact on troop movement into erstwhile East Pakistan, now Bangladesh.
Hashim Qureshi, a Srinagar resident who went to Peshawar on family business in 1969, met Maqbool Bhat of the National Liberation Front (NLF), a self-declared 'armed wing' of the Azad Kashmir Plebiscite Front. Qureshi was persuaded to join the NLF and given an ideological education and lessons in guerrilla tactics in Rawalpindi. In order to draw the world's attention to the Kashmiri independence movement, the NLF planned an airline hijacking fashioned after the Dawson's Field hijackings by the Palestinian militants. Hashim Qureshi, along with his cousin Ashraf Qureshi, was ordered to execute one. A former Pakistani air force pilot Jamshed Manto trained him for the task. However, Qureshi was arrested by the Indian Border Security Force when he tried to reenter the Indian-administered Kashmir with arms and equipment. He negotiated his way out by claiming to help find other conspirators that were allegedly in the Indian territory,and sought an appointment in the Border Security Force to provide such help. Maqbool Bhat sent replacement equipment for the hijacking, but it fell into the hands of a double agent, who then turned it over to the Indian authorities. Undeterred, the Qureshis made look-alike explosives out of wood and hijacked an Indian Airlines plane called Ganga on 30 January 1971.
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