Jaish-e-Mohammed (JeM), the Pakistan-based terrorist organisation, launched its first women’s wing, Jamaat-ul-Mominaat, on October 8, 2025. According to sources close to the terror outfit, Sadiya Azhar, the sister of JeM chief and UN-designated terrorist Muhammad Masood Azhar Alvi, is in charge of this wing. It may be noted that Sadiya’s husband Yusuf Azhar was killed during Operation Sindoor on May 7, 2025 when the Indian Air Force targeted Markaz Subhanallah base of JeM in Bahawalpur, the 13th most populous city of Pakistan.

On October 29, 2025, Masood Azhar released a 21-minute audio message, outlining a detailed plan for training, indoctrinating and deploying women in each and every district of Pakistan under a Muntazima (an Urdu word meaning a female manager or organiser). He stressed that women can “go straight to paradise” by joining the Jamaat-ul-Mominaat.

Masood Azhar is heard saying in the audio clip that the enemies of JeM (read India) have started inducting women as officers in their Army, Air Force and Navy. Hence, the JeM is also uniting women to confront them (the Hindu women). According to the JeM chief, women would undergo training, mirroring the structure of the outfit’s long-running male training programme. He further claimed that the move was a part of his long-term Global Jihad Mission.

Meanwhile, Masood Azhar issued a decree for members of the Jamaat-ul-Mominaat, stating: “Women joining the brigade must not speak to any unrelated men through phone or messenger, except their husbands or immediate family members.” He also urged women cadres to read his book Ae Musalman Behna (O Muslim Sister) as part of their indoctrination. The chief of the terror outfit further announced that male Mujahids of the JeM would work together with this newly-formed female unit in an attempt to “spread Islam across the world“.

Interestingly, JeM’s Daura-e-Tarbiat has served as the primary indoctrination stage for male recruits for the last 20 years, convincing them that jihad against India guarantees paradise. Masood Azhar has decided to extend the same ideological training to women. He insisted that any woman who joins Jamaat-ul-Mominaat “will go straight to paradise from her grave after death”. He explained that women, after completing the preliminary course, would advance to a second stage, Daura-Ayat-ul-Nisah, which would teach how Islamic texts “instruct women to conduct jihad“.

Reports suggest that Samaira Azhar (also known as Umme Masood, another sister of the JeM chief) and Afeera Farooq, the widow of Pulwama attacker Umar Farooq, are also part of the leadership as Masood Azhar has asked them to conduct daily online sessions in order to motivate, as well as recruit, women cadres. Samaira started conducting online classes five days a week from October 25, 2025.

In retaliation for the April 22, 2025 Pahalgam terror attack in Jammu and Kashmir that claimed the lives of 26 innocent civilians, India launched a major military operation to destroy terror infrastructure in neighbouring Pakistan. The counterterror action, code-named Operation Sindoor, struck nine key terror hubs across Pakistan and Pakistan-occupied-Kashmir, destroying major bases of JeM and Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT). The Indian Air Force reduced their headquarters in Bahawalpur and Muridke to rubble by carrying out precision airstrikes. Later, Masood Azhar admitted that 14 of his family members, including Yousuf Azhar, Jameel Ahmed, Hamza Jameel and Huzaifa Azhar, were killed in Operation Sindoor. In the audio clip, he has confirmed that his elder sister Hawa Bibi, too, died in the same strike, revealing that he had conceptualised the idea of a women’s brigade with his elder sister before her demise.

Read: Masood Azhar’s sister to lead Jaish-e-Mohammed’s first women’s wing in Pakistan

In what may be seen as a controversial move, the Government of Pakistani Prime Minister Mian Muhammad Shehbaz Sharif reportedly compensated Masood Azhar with Rs 14 crore (USD 49,456) soon after the Operation Sindoor. Later, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi stated: “The Pakistani Army and the Government of Pakistan continue to nurture terrorism. One day, it will lead to Pakistan’s own destruction.”

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Published by Koushik Das

Koushik Das (born on May 16, 1976 in Kolkata) is a career journalist. Based in the Indian capital of New Delhi, Koushik writes mainly about foreign policies and current geopolitical issues, and rarely about other topics. His own political ideas are highly influenced by Antonio Gramsci, Louis Althusser, Michel Foucault, Michael Oakeshott and others. English philosopher and political theorist Oakeshott (Dec 11, 1901-Dec 19, 1990) says that “in political activity, men sail a boundless and bottomless sea. There is neither harbour for shelter nor floor for anchorage, neither starting-place, nor appointed destination. But we have to keep afloat”. (Rationalism in Politics, 1962) As a student of Political Science, Koushik loves to share his views on issues, which have great impacts on his thought process (and also on India, South Asia and of course on the global community), with his readers through his website – Boundless Ocean of Politics. By doing so, he tries to keep himself afloat. You will find some of his articles in https://inserbia.info/today/ (https://inserbia.info/today/author/kou_das13_i/), as he has been trying to assess the global geopolitics since 2003. You can also mail him at kousdas@gmail.com View all posts by Koushik Das