Daesh in South Asia

Abstract

Daesh has emerged out of the instability and chaos of the Middle East and aims to expand its influence across the world as stated in its motto of „remaining and expanding.‟ The objective of this paper is to point out that Daesh ingress in South Asia must be seen as a threat to the entire region and not as a problem of individual states. It tries to assess in broad strokes the vulnerability of South Asian countries in conjunction with their historical background and current circumstances to analyse possible implications of the group‟s presence. While Daesh may try to exploit the fault lines of religious militancy and sectarianism in South Asia, factors such as intact sovereignty and integrity of states along with stronger militaries could help contain this phenomenon. Meanwhile, it is the group‟s technological hold and effective use of social media which highlights the need of collective regional cooperation for devising counterstrategies against this phenomenon.