Lashkar-e-Taiba was founded in Pakistan in the late 1980s as a militant wing of Markaz-ud-Dawa-wal-Irshad, an Islamist organization influenced by the Ahl-e-Hadith school of Sunni Islam. It ultimately seeks to establish Muslim rule over the entire Indian subcontinent. Though based in Pakistan, Lashkar-e-Taiba initially operated in Jammu and Kashmir, on the Pakistan-India border, but by the first decade of the 21st century the group had expanded its reach farther into India. The Kashmir region is claimed by both India, a largely Hindu country, and Pakistan, a largely Muslim country, and the dispute gave rise to many armed groups within Jammu and Kashmir. Lashkar-e-Taiba has been declared a terrorist organization by the United Nations and India along with several other countries such as Canada, the United Kingdom, and the United States.

One of the largest militant groups operating in Jammu and Kashmir, Lashkar-e-Taiba is pro-Pakistan regarding control of the region. The group opposes any concessions to India. Further, its leaders continue to express the desire to establish Islamic rule throughout India. The group has participated in several terror attacks targeting non-Muslim civilian populations in Jammu and Kashmir in an effort to create a Muslim state.

Many of Lashkar-e-Taiba’s members are Pakistani or Afghan. The group is believed to have had ties with Afghanistan’s Taliban government and with Osama bin Laden, the late founder and leader of al-Qaeda. Fighters from Lashkar-e-Taiba and another militant Muslim group, Hizb-ul-Mujahideen, were killed in August 1998 when U.S. cruise missiles struck bin Laden’s training camps in Afghanistan, and a senior al-Qaeda official was captured in a Lashkar-e-Taiba safe house in Pakistan in March 2002.

Early activities

Lashkar-e-Taiba made its first incursions into Jammu and Kashmir in 1993. In the late 1990s it was alleged that the group received funding from agencies of the Pakistani government, an allegation the government denied. The group began operating in the Jammu region, which had large numbers of non-Muslims. Working in conjunction with Hizb-ul-Mujahideen, Lashkar-e-Taiba began a program of attacks against Hindus and Sikhs.

Lashkar-e-Taiba attacks have often been aimed at civilians. Beginning in 1999 the group conducted a series of suicide attacks against Indian security forces, often targeting seemingly secure headquarters.

In 2000 Lashkar-e-Taiba had a falling-out with Hizb-ul-Mujahideen, which had declared a short-lived ceasefire with India. The group lost more allies in 2001, after the September 11 attacks on the United States led to the removal of the Taliban government in Afghanistan by U.S.-led military forces. On December 13 that year, Lashkar-e-Taiba undertook a suicide attack on India’s parliament complex in the capital, New Delhi, in conjunction with Jaish-e-Mohammed, another militant group recognized as a terrorist organization by the United Nations and several countries including India, the United Kingdom, and the United States. In response, the United States government froze the U.S. assets of Lashkar-e-Taiba and declared it a terrorist organization. Under pressure from the United States to crack down on such groups and to avoid a war with India, the government of Pakistan banned Lashkar-e-Taiba in January 2002 and arrested its leader, Hafiz Muhammad Saeed, but he was released a few months later. He established a charity organization known as the Jamaat-ud-Dawa, which became widely viewed as a front for Lashkar-e-Taiba.

Following a ceasefire accord between India and Pakistan in 2003, Lashkar-e-Taiba was believed to have moved most of its operations to northwestern Pakistan, an area bordering Afghanistan over which the central government did not have control. The organization also increasingly focused its activities on India itself.

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The 2006 Mumbai train bombings

Lashkar-e-Taiba operatives are believed to have continued their attacks throughout the first decade of the 21st century. Those incidents primarily targeted Indian security forces. In 2006, however, the group was implicated in a considerably more deadly attack against civilians in Mumbai, one of India’s most populous cities. On July 11 of that year, seven bombs tore through Mumbai’s commuter train system during the evening rush hour, killing 189 people and injuring more than 800. The bombs were all placed in first-class train compartments in an apparent effort to target India’s professional class. Following the attack, which India linked to Lashkar-e-Taiba, Pakistan once again detained Saeed and once again released him, claiming that India’s investigation was biased.

The 2008 Mumbai terrorist attacks

Two years later, in the evening on November 26, 2008, 10 gunmen landed boats in Mumbai, spread out to popular tourist destinations, and began shooting people. The gunmen, who were well armed and well trained, eventually met up in two luxury hotels and a Jewish outreach center. They took hostages at all three locations and held off Indian police and military for three days. More than 170 people died in the attacks, including nine of the attackers. Ajmal Kasab, one of the operatives, was captured alive, and confessed that he was a member of Lashkar-e-Taiba, that he had trained in Pakistan, and that the attackers had come to Mumbai by boat from Karachi. He was convicted of murder in India in 2010 and was executed in November 2012.

Pakistan’s response

Pakistan had been reluctant to appear to give in to Indian pressure over Lashkar-e-Taiba’s activities, but the solidity of the evidence, combined with pressure from the United States and the United Nations, spurred the country to raid Lashkar-e-Taiba camps and arrest several operatives linked to the Mumbai siege. Pakistan also made public in July 2009 an investigation that reached largely the same conclusions as India’s, acknowledging that Lashkar-e-Taiba had indeed planned and launched the attack from Pakistan.

Formal charges were brought against those Lashkar-e-Taiba operatives detained in Pakistan in October 2009; the trial did not begin until May 2012, however, because of various delays and controversies, including accusations that one of the defense lawyers had a fake law degree. The Pakistani government did not link Saeed with the attack conclusively, however, and he claimed to have renounced violence. He was nonetheless repeatedly placed under house arrest.

Global fallout

In October 2009, David Headley, an American of Pakistani extraction, was arrested by U.S. authorities on charges that he had helped Lashkar-e-Taiba plan the 2008 Mumbai attacks. He pleaded guilty to a number of charges and in January 2013 was sentenced to 35 years in U.S. federal prison. In September 2015 a Mumbai court convicted 12 members of Lashkar-e-Taiba on charges connected with the 2006 train bombings. The charges included criminal conspiracy and membership in a terrorist group; 5 of the 12 were also convicted of murder. Indian authorities had also accused Tahawwur Rana, a Canadian citizen and Chicago-based businessman of Pakistani origin, of assisting Headley, and later requested his extradition. After a lengthy legal process in the U.S., starting in 2011, Rana was extradited to India in April 2025.

Major attacks linked to Lashkar-e-Taiba

In 2019 a suicide bombing by Jaish-e-Mohammed in Jammu and Kashmir mounted international pressure on Pakistan to crack down on militant groups operating illegally within its borders. Saeed was arrested and charged later that year for his involvement with a proscribed organization. He was sentenced to more than five years in prison in 2020 but planned to appeal his conviction.

On April 22, 2025, gunmen opened fire on tourists at a popular spot near the resort town of Pahalgam, Jammu and Kashmir. The terror attack left 26 people dead. The Resistance Front (TRF; also called Kashmir Resistance), a group that Indian security officials described as an offshoot of Lashkar-e-Taiba, initially claimed responsibility. The TRF later retracted the claim, alleging that its digital platforms had been compromised by a “breach.”

Although Lashkar-e-Taiba is believed by Indian authorities to have carried out or planned several attacks in India, the group rarely claims responsibility. In some cases, more than one group has been linked to the same attack. Some of the key attacks in which Lashkar-e-Taiba is suspected to be involved are listed below.

• Anantnag, Jammu and Kashmir (2017): Seven pilgrims were killed in a terror attack after gunmen opened fire on a bus returning from the Amarnath shrine. Lashkar-e-Taiba is believed to have planned the attack.
• Mumbai (2008): More than 170 people were killed in attacks carried out by Lashkar-e-Taiba-linked operatives at multiple landmark buildings in Mumbai, including the Taj Mahal Palace hotel, the Chattrapati Shivaji Terminus railway station, and a Jewish outreach center.
• Mumbai (2006): Seven explosions in commuter trains across Mumbai killed 189 people and injured more than 800. Indian authorities accused Lashkar-e-Taiba of arming and training the attackers, some of whom were allegedly members of the Students Islamic Movement of India (SIMI), a group banned in India.
• Mumbai (2003): Bombings at the Gateway of India and Zaveri Bazaar killed more than 50 people. Three people with alleged links to Lashkar-e-Taiba were convicted and given the death penalty by an Indian court.
• Kaluchak, Jammu and Kashmir (2002): Terrorists opened fire on a bus and an army residential colony, killing 30 people, including women and children. Indian authorities accused Lashkar-e-Taiba, among other groups, of orchestrating the attack.
• Red Fort, Delhi (2000): Lashkar-e-Taiba gunmen opened fire on army personnel stationed at the historically and politically significant Red Fort. Three people died in the attack. In a rare admission, the group claimed responsibility for the attack.
• Wandhama, Jammu and Kashmir (1998): The massacre in which 23 Kashmiri Pandits—a Hindu community native to the Kashmir valley—were killed has been attributed to multiple militant groups, including Harkat-ul-Ansar, Hizb-ul-Mujahideen, and Lashkar-e-Taiba. The exact perpetrator remains disputed.