Having given its ritual call to boycot Independence Day 2010 in the north-eastern region, with threats of attacks and some bomb blasts preceding it, the United Liberation Front of Asom (Ulfa) — which has been trying desperately to regroup under the aegis of its elusive boss Paresh Baruah — has tied up with the National Democratic Front of Bodoland (NDFB) and is attempting to garner support from Manipur-based terrorist groups. The Ulfa and the NDFB are engaging the Manipur People’s Liberation Front, the People’s Revolutionary Party of Kangleipak, the People’s Liberation Army and the United National Liberation Front to launch attacks in Assam. The Independence Day celebrations were held without any attack, thanks to the Army’s vigilance and stepped-up activity of the state police and Central paramilitary forces.
Recent reports in this daily and the leading newspapers of Bangladesh are worth noting. While this daily throws more light on China’s support to India’s Northeast terrorist groups, the Bangladeshi newspapers, for the first time since the Awami League taking over last year, elaborated on its Rapid Action Battalion’s (RAB) operations against the Ulfa, whose leaders and cadres have been on the run.
This daily’s report about Paresh Baruah being granted a Chinese visa, brings out, (a) the irony of the Indian Army’s GOC-in-C, Northern Command, Lt. Gen. B.S. Jaswal being refused a Chinese visa in his present capacity, whereas he was issued one earlier, when he was GOC of a corps headquartered in Arunachal Pradesh. Terrorist boss Baruah (and most likely many of his honchos) being obliged not only with a visa but also assured sustained support for anti-Indian activities and (b) the report matches with inputs about most Ulfa elements earlier ensconced in Bangladesh being driven out of it after the Awami League’s taking over and their escaping to China as well as shuttling between China and Burma. A security-related portal cited authoritative sources confirming that Baruah made repeated trips to Kunming in China and that he had been assured aid and assistance to restore his organisation along the China-Burma border. According to this portal, “There is also evidence of an increasing flow of Chinese small arms into India, in volumes that suggest direct state collusion or facilitation. China’s broader moves across the South and Southeast Asian regions have acquired a quiet and sustained menace, which India remains unprepared to resist.”
Bangladesh dailies carried an interesting account of the wide range of activities of the Ulfa leader Ranjan Chowdhury, who was arrested with his Bangladeshi aide, Pradip Marak, at Bhairab, Kishoreganj, on July 17 by the Rapid Action Battalion with one pistol, one revolver, four handmade bombs and bomb-making materials. For the first time since the Awami League government came back to power in early January 2009, the task force for interrogation (TFI) paraded the arrested duo and made some rare revelations to the media.
A former general secretary of the Dhubri district unit of Ulfa, Chowdhury, with many aliases — Major Ranjan, Pradip Roy, Dip Jyoti, Ranju Barai and Masud — was responsible for planning/coordinating/launching violent attacks, providing shelter, whenever necessary following pressure from the Indian Army and security forces to cadres of 109 battalion (one of the five battalions of the Ulfa) based in Meghalaya. In Bangladesh, he controlled operatives in Sherpur, Kurigram and Sylhet districts bordering Assam and made frequent trips to India, according to the RAB officials.
Money was never a problem for Ulfa as Baruah and gang, in connivance with the Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence, stationed there and many Bangladesh Nationalist Party fundamentalists and loyalists in government, had established thriving multifarious “businesses”. From Chowdhury’s “annual budget” of Taka 9.5 lakhs from Ulfa, 4 lakhs was for the treatment of the wounded members, one lakh for transporting members crossing border, 1.5 lakhs for their food, and 3 lakhs for giving his neighbours gift during festivals in a bid to maintain good relations with them, the interrogation statement reads. Apart from bearing all his expenses and a motorcycle for movement, the Ulfa provided him Taka 10 to 12 lakhs for construction of a house and another Taka 2 lakhs for running a business, which in his case, was orchards and fishing at his home in Jhenigati, Sherpur, where he married a Bangladeshi woman in 2001 in the presence of Paresh Baruah and other Ulfa leaders as baraatis. Baruah himself and many other Ulfa members married Bangladeshi women and assumed Muslim names to evade identification. Baruah is also known as Zaman.
While Chowdhury, whose interrogation included queries about the largest ever haul in Bangladesh of 10 truckload of firearms seized in Chittagong in 2004, denied any knowledge of it, the police found enough evidence that the consignment was smuggled in for Ulfa. On April 2, 2004, the Bangladesh police and coast guard had seized 1300 x 7.62 mm automatic rifles, 150 x 40mm rocket launchers, 840 x 40mm rockets, 400 x 9mm semi-automatic spot rifles, 100 “tommy guns”, 150 rocket launchers, 2,000 launching grenades, 25,020 hand grenades, 6,392 magazines of SMG and other arms and almost two million rounds of ammunition.
The Ulfa may be down in India, but Baruah and Co Ltd are going strong with many business ventures, including a lucrative arms trade on maritime routes in conjunction with the National Socialist Council of Nagaland (Isac-Muivah) and are involved in supplying arms to Naxals/Maoists.
When the Indian Army launched Operation Bajrang in Assam in the end of November 1990, one of Ulfa’s top leaders, Munin Nabish, appointed as the “resident agent” in Bangladesh, was already in Pakistan where he met an ISI officer named Chaudhuri to finalise arrangements for the visit of his cohorts, the then chairman Arbinda Rajkhowa, vice-chairman Pradeep Gogoi, general secretary Golap Baruah and commander-in-chief Paresh Baruah to that country. The group of five visited Islamabad and the Afghanistan border in March-April 1991 to meet the Afghan strongman Gulbuddin Hekmatyar who promised to supply arms to the Ulfa. Rajkhowa’s diary and other recovered documents confirmed this visit.
This arrest and many earlier ones of the Indian terrorists, including Ulfa’s, enjoying shelter and support by the previous BNP government is part of the process as per Sheikh Hasina’s resolve to cleanse Bangladesh of fundamentalists and terrorists who had proliferated during the past couple of decades. It is also an affirmation of her assurance to renew and improve ties with India, conveyed by her foreign minister, Dipu Moni, during her first visit to New Delhi last year. Rajkhowa and a number of the Ulfa and the NDFB terrorists have been handed over to India, which must extend whatever possible assistance to Bangladesh in improving its security and also settle outstanding contentious issues.
Anil Bhat, a retired Army officer, is a defence and security analyst based in New Delhi