The ISI connection, magnified
Anil Bhat, The Statesman
January 13, 2008
http://www.thestatesman.net/page.news.php?clid=14&id=185761&usrsess=1

IF the Ulfa began 2007 by giving the ISI a macabre New Year’s gift by way of killing Biharis and Hindi-speaking people in Assam, then at the end of that year it presented a “bonus” by adding at least two more groups – Karbis and Adivasis — to Assam’s terror network.

A diary of events as reported by rediff.com provides pointers to the expanding ISI-Ulfa terror network, particularly following the losses suffered by the latter after a year’s Army/security force operations against it. Namely:

* 4 December 2007: The 5959-Up Kamrup Express (between Howrah and Tinsukia in Upper Assam) was damaged in an explosion triggered by suspected tribal Karbi militants at Khatkhati in Assam’s Karbi Anglong district. About 400 passengers escaped unhurt and the train resumed its journey after the damaged locomotive was replaced;

* 7 December: A Black Widow (a splinter group of North Cachar Hills’ Dima Halam Daogah) militant was killed and another injured in a gun battle with the police in the Guruhari area under the Dehangi police station, a few kilometres from Haflong where the police and Army had to intensify operations;

* 10 December 2007: One person was killed and 55 passengers were injured when 14 bogies of the Brahmaputra Mail (Guwahati to New Delhi) were derailed 15 km from the New Jalpaiguri junction;

* 13 December: At least five persons were killed and four others seriously injured when a bomb exploded on the New Delhi-bound Rajdhani Express near Sungajan railway station of Assam’s Golaghat district. The police suspects the involvement of the All Adivasi National Liberation Army; and

* 15 December 2007: An ISI operative, SM Alam, responsible for all operational matters of the ISI in Assam and the North-east and under surveillance of the Assam police for some time, was nabbed in Guwahati. He is a member of Jamati Islami and Chatra Sibir in Bangladesh and joined the Pakistan-based Harkat-ul-Mujahideen in 1993. He underwent training in Pakistan-occupied Kashmir, the police claimed

Shortly after Ulfa’s self- styled commander- in-chief Paresh Barua and his coterie escaped to Bangladesh, a statement was tabled in the Assam assembly under Item No 12, dated 6.4.2000, by then chief minister Prafulla Kumar Mahanta. It stated that the Assam police had gathered sufficient evidence to prove that the ISI was actively involved in fomenting violence and terrorism in the state. Specifically, these activities were stated as: promoting indiscriminate violence in the state by providing active support to the local militant outfits; creating new militant outfits along ethnic and communal lines by instigating ethnic and religious groups; supplying explosives and sophisticated arms to various terrorist groups; causing sabotage of oil pipelines and other installations, communication lines, railways and roads; promoting fundamentalism and militancy among local Muslim youth by misleading them in the name of “jihad” and inciting communal tension between Hindus and Muslims by way of false and highly inflammatory propaganda.

This ISI aim has continued, expanding its network over the years since early 1990. Neither the India-Pakistan peace process that began in early 2004 nor the caretaker government of Bangladesh was able to check the ISI’s activities in the North-east. In fact, after the peace process started, not only did the ISI step up its operations it also began extending its activities to other parts of the country.

General Pervez Musharraf’s shedding his uniform will not help change the ISI’s efforts to keep India on the boil. If reports of two terrorist training camps that were destroyed by Bangladesh’s caretaker government are true, it will hardly cause any dent to the North-east’s terrorist groups. In any case, Bangladesh’s Directorate General of Forces Intelligence, which has been part of the ISI’s eastern operations since early 1991, has only consolidated more power during the current caretaker government’s term.

India sent relief materials for the cyclone-affected people of Bangladesh in November and December 2007. Following this, Bangladesi security forces destroyed one camp of Indian rebels. That makes little difference to the rest of many other groups, including the top Ulfa leadership ensconced there and nullifying whatever gains may have been made by the more than year long Army operation in Assam.

While illegal Bangladeshi migrants actively assisted by the Ulfa are dished out ration cards to increase vote banks in various constituencies of Assam, security forces are fated to keep “managing” terror — but for how much longer?

(The author, a strategic analyst, is chief editor, WordSword Feature and media.)