Quite how Dhiren Barot changed from an average schoolboy living in north west London to one of the most "senior and ruthless" terrorists British security services have come across is an example of the persuasive power of radical Islam.

He grew up in a quiet London suburb after being brought to this country from Baroda, India, shortly after he was born in December 1971.

He attended the sought-after Kingsbury High School where he was a studious but average pupil.

Friends recall that he planned a career in hotel management and had normal teenage interests such as fashion and music. He left school in 1988 and obtained a City and Guilds qualification in tourism before going on to work in various travel agencies and hotels.

His only long-term job was as a ticketing clerk for an airline based in Piccadilly, where at one point he requested a transfer to Heathrow, but was turned down.

Police also discovered that at one time he worked as a porter for a luxury group of apartments in London, and may have also had a job with a phone company.

But in his early twenties he abandoned his Hindu faith and plans for a career in hotel management and answered the call to jihad against the West, converting to Islam.

After attending a lecture by the now-jailed cleric Abu Hamza, where he was told of the Mujahidin and the concept of jihad, Barot began to frequently discuss how to help "oppressed" Islamic people abroad.

In September 1995, he left his ticketing clerk job, saying that he was going on a prolonged trip overseas.

But his journey was not a backpacking trip. It took him to Pakistan and later to a terrorist training camp in the disputed territory of Kashmir.

There, he was given instruction in using weapons and explosives, a pattern that was to be repeated in a later further trip to the Philippines.

"Class notes" that Barot appears to have taken showed he learned skills such as "how to blow up a bridge" and details on making poisons such as ricin and botulinum, the most toxic substance known to man.

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