The Assam Tribune online
Guwahati, Saturday, November 18, 2006
EDITORIAL
MESSAGE FOR TODAY
The terrorist and the policeman both come from the same basket.
— JOSEPH CONRAD

Threat of jehadis
Growth of activities of the jehadi groups in Bangladesh is posing a serious security threat to the North East region of the country and concerted efforts must be launched by the Government of India and the Governments of the States of the region to deal with the threat. What is more dangerous is that the security agencies have very little intelligence input about the activities of those groups in the region and therefore steps should be taken to boost the intelligence network in the international border areas and the areas having sizeable presence of suspected infiltrators. The recently concluded meeting of the police chiefs of the North Eastern States, which was also attended by senior officials of the Intelligence Bureau and Army, discussed the threat posed by the jehadi elements to the region, which is a positive sign as no State alone can deal with the threat. The decision to increase vigil along the Indo-Bangla border with deployment of more forces is also a positive step, which should check attempts of such elements inimical to India from sneaking into the country from Bangladesh. Of course, deployment of a few additional companies of Border Security Force (BSF) alone will not totally prevent infiltration of jehadi elements to India and immediate steps should be taken to complete the fencing along the international border and the quality of the existing fencing must be improved. Floodlights should also be installed along the border fencing to improve visibility at night.

Though the jehadi elements have not created any major disturbance in Asom or any other part of the North East as yet, the threat is looming large and if the growth of such groups is not checked immediately, the possibility of Asom facing a situation like Jammu and Kashmir in the days to come cannot be ruled out. In fact, the security agencies were not even aware of the presence of groups like Harkat Ul Mujahideen (HUM) in the State till late 1990s and the threat came to light only after the arrest of four dreaded agents of the Pakistani Inter Services Intelligence (ISI) in Guwahati city. Following the arrest of the ISI agents, the network of the HUM in the State was busted and more than 40 militants belonging to the group were either arrested or they surrendered before the police. But the most disturbing fact of the whole episode was that the HUM men arrested during the operation confessed before the police and security forces that they were taken to Pakistan for training through Bangladesh by taking advantage of the porous international border and the security forces were not aware of the fact before their arrest. The possibility of youths of the State being taken to Pakistan even today cannot be ruled out and immediate steps should be taken to prevent any such attempt.

Dreaded militant Akram Master, who hails from Barpeta, was the key man behind organising the activities of the HUM in the State and according to intelligence reports, later he formed the terrorist group Jaish-E-Mohammad along with the terrorist group involved in the hijacking of the Indian Airlines flight from Kathmandu. Though Akram is now believed to be in Pakistan it is not known whether he is still trying to take advantage of his roots in the State to mobilise youths to join hands with the forces inimical to India. With very little security presence in the char areas along the international border, the elements of the fundamentalist forces can very easily take shelter there after sneaking into the country before fanning out to other parts and to deal with the situation, police and security presence in the chars must be improved without further delay and photo identity cards should be provided to the people living along the international border to help the BSF in detecting foreigners who manage to sneak into India.