Internal Security Watch

[SRoy]

a three prong attack might work.
eliminate the controllers abroad. shame the overt cheerleaders...honey trapping for example.
and the on the ground follow a scorched earth policy, very clear instruction to CI units that no prisoners to be taken.

CRPF also needs to to build its reputation.
during early to mid 90s, Kashmiri terrorists used to urinate when threatened to be turned over to BSF for interrogation. BSF has built this reputation over many decades. when we were in SriNagar in early 80's I remember BSF troopers beating the $hit out of unruly Kashmiri biraders in broad daylight without any interference from J&K Police or the Army. The peaceful awaam there has come to hold the BSF in high regard ever since.

the soni sori variety of tribals are no match for such treatment and they'll come around very quickly.

[Abhi_G]

^^^
How to handle the merchant-contractor-mafia-police-politico nexus that forms the part of the 'state'? They were the ones that handed over the regions to the reds in the very first place no? CI operations with scorched earth is just part of the campaign. The above nexus remains unscathed.

Regarding, party hopping bleeding hearts (ladies and gents), yes "heart stealers' may be the only option.

[SRoy]

^^

is merchant-contractor-mafia-police-politico becoming an excuse for red terror?
does such nexus exist in urban areas or not?
or does it exist in other villages outside central Indian tribal belt or not?

I think this narrative from the media needs to be challenged.

things have come to a point even govt. initiative like roads and healthcare facilities are attacked by Naxals. Maybe its too early to point out, but the tribal themselves are not innocent lambs either.
In WB, I'm aware of state govt. schemes to enable these people to mix with mainstream with jobs and lands, with little success, as many of these ran away and went back to their tribal ways.

[Supratik]

We need to go after the heads who are largely non-tribal e.g. the killing of Kishanji. The overground workers will become fringe elements without the insurgents. I would suggest targeted elimination of the leadership rather than scorched earth tactics as the latter will turn off the tribals from whom they recruit.

[Abhi_G]

SRoy,

No the nexus is not an excuse for Naxalism, rather one of the causes in a very complex web of reasons. Personally, I feel we are witnessing a tug-of-war between a push towards industrialized urbanized life and non-industrialized village and forest based lifestyles. In this bigger context, we have to realize that the police atrocity thing is not so untrue. The police story in India unfortunately is an extension of the tactics of the erstwhile East India Company and the successor brit raj - check how the east India company ravages villages, 1857, 1942 crushing of the rebellion in Medinipur etc. Of course, it would be unfair to say the police is doing something of the same magnitude but it does something similar on a much lower scale. The story of how the lady from Behala was treated while congis crushed naxals in Bengal may be a pointer towards that. The story might be of a son or daughter of a particular family that got entangled in the web. But stories of police atrocity whether true or false spreads fast and furiously and in the din of allegations and counter-allegations, the veracity of the story cannot be established anymore.

Of course, the story of police atrocity surfaces everywhere whether it is J&K, Northeast or Punjab. A lot of falsehoods are perpetrated through media and NGOs pumped by finance from missionary sources and foreign powers. These are the overground cheer leaders whose job is to blunt any genuine effort to solve the problem. But there is something more about the involvement of the state in this affair. Why do the naxals suddenly become active in non-congi states? Does it not point to some degree of penetration by one power group that uses naxals as a tactical tool to keep other political powers in check? The CRPF etc., may be just caught in this game of see-saw. The mafia-police-contractor-politician nexus is also part of that game of deceit.

The Central tribal belt of India is unique. Because of the existence of dense forests and lack of connectivity. Well the Vindhya forests are always shrouded in mystery since ancient times! Did the Pandavas not spend their agnyatavaas there? But that is a digression.

[chaanakya]

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/indi ... 754708.cms

The operation and the blow it has dealt to IM has been a source of huge respite and pride for Indian agencies. However, the celebration of the success is marred by the regret over the mishandling of Yasin Bhatkal's arrest. Unlike Waqas, agencies never got to spend "free time" with Bhatkal because of what sources allege was the "political cowardice" of Bihar authorities. That a garrulous officer of an agency blurted out the breakthrough to his colleagues in Bangalore did not help.

That the lesson has been learnt was evident when RAW and IB did not involve others before the stage of arrest in Waqas's case.

[Raja Bose]

Heart rending video of a Deputy Commandant of CRPF who was injured in an IED blast earlier today, begging to be taken to a hospital as no doctor has come to attend to him and all his blood has flown out. Lying on the stretcher, he pleads: "I have small children, saheb. Please save me. I will die in a few minutes. Please tell DG or president to send a helicopter for me." All to no avail. He just died.

According to CRPF, he survived.

[Agnimitra]

RAW agents raced ahead of ISI to nab IM’s Pak operative Waqas in Dhaka

A small mistake on part of the ISI in preparing passport for Indian Mujahideen's (IM) Pakistani operative Zia-ur Rehman alias Waqas landed him in the net of Indian agencies {So "Indian" Mujahideen is driven by Bakistani operatives?}. Waqas had been hiding in Bangladesh and was supposed to leave for Pakistan via Nepal when he was apprehended by India's external intelligence agency Research and Analysis Wing (RAW).

According to sources in the security establishment, though there had been some information about the possibility of Waqas being in Bangladesh, Indian agencies were clueless about his exact location. However, their sustained interest in the ISI agent who had been loaned to IM made Waqas's handlers in Pakistan's spy agency worried that their asset had been exposed and needed to be brought home.

Accordingly, ISI got a passport made for Waqas. However, when he reached the airport, Bangladesh's immigration officials discovered that there was no entry stamp on his passport. Even as they set out to detain him, the commotion attracted the attention of a RAW staffer who swiftly used his smart phone to photograph one of India's biggest tormentors and relayed it to his superiors.

RAW officers were thrilled when they saw that the six-feet man being held at Dhaka airport was their elusive quarry. What followed was an intense spy game in which Indian agents managed to spirit him away to India without leaving footprints.

How they managed to get him out of the airport and then to India remains unclear. But Waqas proved his utility by furnishing details of IM cells with whom he had collaborated and who would host him. The success was kept a closely guarded secret and Waqas was "encouraged" to do web chats with IM operatives, particularly Tehseen Akhtar "Monu", without raising suspicion.

Waqas's monitors made him seek a meeting with Tehseen. Although the IM commander was holed up in Rourkela at the time, intelligence agencies resisted the temptation to get Waqas to seek a rendezvous with him in Odisha's steel city. Instead, Waqas was made to insist that the meeting should happen, as usual, at their known hideout in Nepal.

As an unsuspecting Tehseen set out for Nepal, Indian agencies alerted their counterparts in the neighbouring country. Nepal Police, in a remarkable example of cross-border counter-terror cooperation, had the meeting point sealed as soon as Tehseen arrived. He was detained and later "pushed" into West Bengal to be "arrested" by Delhi Police.

The operation and the blow it has dealt to IM has been a source of huge respite and pride for Indian agencies. However, the celebration of the success is marred by the regret over the mishandling of Yasin Bhatkal's arrest. Unlike Waqas, agencies never got to spend "free time" with Bhatkal because of what sources allege was the "political cowardice" of Bihar authorities. That a garrulous officer of an agency blurted out the breakthrough to his colleagues in Bangalore did not help.

With the word out about Bhatkal being in Indian custody, TV channels were soon swarming all over, forcing the agencies to comply with the procedures. Now, the top-ranking jihadi terrorist, assured of the safeguards enshrined in the Constitution, has been giving a hard time to interrogators. Sources said the shrewd terrorist would turn back the interrogators by saying he was feeling fatigued, or that he needed to focus on his spiritual obligations.

That the lesson has been learnt was evident when RAW and IB did not involve others before the stage of arrest in Waqas's case.

[sum]

Now, the top-ranking jihadi terrorist, assured of the safeguards enshrined in the Constitution, has been giving a hard time to interrogators. Sources said the shrewd terrorist would turn back the interrogators by saying he was feeling fatigued, or that he needed to focus on his spiritual obligations.

What non-sense is this?

[JE Menon]

>>in the ISI agent who had been loaned

Agnimitra, basically the guy was "on secondment" I suppose.

[abhik]

Now, the top-ranking jihadi terrorist, assured of the safeguards enshrined in the Constitution, has been giving a hard time to interrogators. Sources said the shrewd terrorist would turn back the interrogators by saying he was feeling fatigued, or that he needed to focus on his spiritual obligations.

What non-sense is this?

Terrorists who are foreign national should be declared as Enemies of the State.

[putnanja]

‘Hindu terror’ cases hit dead end

...
It was hoped that a single agency rather than multiple state agencies working at cross-purposes would be able to unmask them. But, three years, a dozen arrests and six charge-sheets later, investigators concede they are not even close to the goal. Instead the agency is coming around to the fact that it does not have enough to even question Indresh Kumar, who is thought to have encouraged the extremists to carry out the strikes and even financed them.

The NIA declined comment on the story.
...
The agency had statements of witnesses and some of the accused against Kumar but these could only be used against him “if we can corroborate them with evidence that can stand judicial scrutiny”, an investigator told HT on condition of anonymity.
...
...
NIA officials say they are hamstrung as the cases were three to six years old when they were asked to probe. “Suppose for a meeting or even for planting a bomb, an accused travelled by bus or train. How can we find record of the journey now and any witnesses who could have seen them travel?” the investigator said. “We doubt if we can prove some of the cases during trial,” he said.
...

[ramana]

The story is bogus. They hit a dead end because there was nothing to unearth! It was a Congress ploy to scare the Indian Muslim and pretend they are being tough on Hindus while the Pakis were taking advantage and pretending to be Indian Mujahddin and bombing India from Patna to Hyderabad and everywhere else in between.

Shame on the NIA for not being true to their oath when they joined the police.

[Prem]

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city ... mesofindia
Nirbhaya rerun in MP: Minor gang-raped and thrown off moving bus

BHOPAL: In a shocking reminiscence of Delhi's Nirbhaya tragedy, a 14-year-old dalit girl was allegedly gang-raped by five people inside a moving bus and then thrown out of the vehicle at Singrauli district in Madhya Pradesh on Sunday.The bus driver was also involved in the monstrous act. The rear wheels of the bus missed the girl by inches as she lay bleeding and unconscious on a dirt road in Nalhatani village, 15km from the district headquarters.A few villagers discovered the girl's unconscious body hours after the incident and took her to the district hospital after informing the police. The victim narrated the ordeal to the police after gaining consciousness.Police said that the victim was returning from her aunt's village when she was offered a lift by the driver of a bus operated by Siddiqui Travels. This bus was hired by a local businessman for a wedding ceremony and it was heading towards the venue to pick up guests.There were around five people inside the bus, including its driver and two cleaners. As soon as the girl boarded the bus, they began molesting her.The girl screamed for help, but the windows were shut. The culprits stopped the bus near a desolate area and dragged the girl inside a forest. All of them took turns to rape her, police said, quoting the victim.The victim told the police that they dragged her back into the bus after raping her and pushed her off the moving bus. The girl suffered serious head injuries.Police said her medical examination report is awaited. Her parents were also informed about the incident. A case has been registered under different sections, including Protection Of Children Against Sexual Offences Act. One of the accused has been detained, police said

[SRoy]

I have been repeatedly saying that the NIA has been created with one and only one purpose i.e. creating fake Hindu terror cases.

Each and every officer in that org must be punished with extreme prejudice after it is disbanded.

How the next govt. treats goon squads like NIA will decide my next vote for 2019.

[ramana]

Similar sentiments:

VIgorously prosecute the scums who did what hey did to Sadhvi Pragya and Col. Purohit - the netas who signed the files, the babaus who carried out the orders, the cops who went out of their way to get into chidu's good books... the whole 9 yards, I say.



Let nobody do such malicious propagandu dressed as a goose chase ever again.

[ramana]

The real story is ISI in TSP took advantage of the gullibility and votebank politics of UPA and infiltrated Paki terrorists as Indian Mujehdin.


What does Neroynanan have to say? It started on his watch as NSA.

Shiv Shankar Menon is hardly a sharp pencil as Sanjay Baru's book shows he was chosen to placate the Communists.

[Sachin]

I have been repeatedly saying that the NIA has been created with one and only one purpose i.e. creating fake Hindu terror cases.

Perhaps a thread should be started to record the "track record" of NIA. I am yet to see any good breakthrough or achievement by this organisation in crime, or terror-related crime solving. The state special branch and the state police CID wings seems to be much much more efficient than these folks.

[Paul]

Per some hacks SS Menon was going to be made Governor J&K. Wonder why it never happened?

[pankajs]

Bhatkal attacked Jama Masjid as foreigners wearing mini skirts entered it: Police

http://www.niticentral.com/2014/04/23/b ... 15298.html

[Gus]

^ i was about to post that. was that incident pinned/tried to pin on "saffron terror"?

[ramana]

We here stuff about Bhatkal this and that. What is the news about Abu Jundal the L-e-T #3 who was captured in KSA? He is in jail for sometime without charges or what?

[chetak]

We here stuff about Bhatkal this and that. What is the news about Abu Jundal the L-e-T #3 who was captured in KSA? He is in jail for sometime without charges or what?

hopefully, undergoing Tough love or some TLC, take your pick

[chetak]

Per some hacks SS Menon was going to be made Governor J&K. Wonder why it never happened?

The new govt should review all decisions taken by the present govt after a certain date including the appointments of sheila dixit, CAG, CVC and EC

[member_28440]

Is CBI Director’s proposal of better co-ordination with Vatican a good idea ?

Mr Ranjit Sinha, Central Bureau of Investigation, India, spoke to delegates about the need to protect vulnerable communities. He described human trafficking as a borderless organised crime with the grave human rights violations – a combination of several crimes in itself like physical, mental, sexual exploitation, debt bondage, commoditization of human beings and deprivation of human dignity.

“The four major issues stated in the background note are: 1) Prevention, 2) Victims support in the country of rescue, 3) Victims support in the source rehabilitated country and 4) Network of agencies – including religious congregations and priests.”

Full speech given by Mr Ranjit Sinha, Director of the Central Bureau of Investigation, India, at the ‘Combating Human Trafficking Church and Law Enforcement Partnership‘ conference in Rome. Titled: “Protecting Vulnerable Communities”. 9 April 2014.

However looking at incidents the Vatican has been rocked with the CBI Director’s proposal seems not a very good idea.

Is CBI Director’s proposal of better co-ordination with Vatican a good idea ?

[Virupaksha]

Per some hacks SS Menon was going to be made Governor J&K. Wonder why it never happened?

The new govt should review all decisions taken by the present govt after a certain date including the appointments of sheila dixit, CAG, CVC and EC

CAG, CVC and EC are constitutional appointments. They will serve their term.

Governors work at the pleasure of president and there is precedence in 2004 when congress got all political nda appointees to resign.

[kish]

posting this article in full, as it contains details about IM, NaMo security, etc

Threat to Modi

Yasin Bhatkal surprised his interrogators late last August when he named all the top 10 on his hit list: Narendra Modi, Narendra Modi, Narendra Modi…. There was no other name. The captured Indian Mujahideen (IM) co- founder appeared remorseless, defiant— and brutally blunt even for a man who’d plant bombs in a mosque because he hated foreign women in short skirts entering it. Bhatkal, who was on the run for eight years and was arrested in Nepal last year, is the key suspect in the case of Pune’s German Bakery attack in February 2010 that killed 17 people. Investigators had identified Bhatkal through CCTV footage from the bakery. “We would do anything to get Modi, at whatever cost,” he told a police officer in Bihar, a state that has emerged as a recruitment ground for jihadists. It was to Bihar that Bhatkal, mastermind of several bomb blasts across India, was first brought from Nepal—where he was living in disguise as an Ayurvedic practitioner, lying low while quietly making plans for his next strike.

Bhatkal’s disclosures should have put the Centre and Nitish Kumar’s government in Bihar on their toes, but they didn’t. Within months, the IM struck again, this time at a Modi rally in Patna, killing eight people and injuring scores of others. A young captured IM terrorist told his interrogators that it was his life’s calling to be a ‘martyr’—and that he and his team had done an extensive recce of various cities in the country where the BJP leader would address rallies, including Kanpur and Allahabad, to chalk out an audacious attempt on his life. If the IM had succeeded in this operation, communal harmony in India would have suffered a heavy blow.

The Central Government was finally shaken out of its slumber, and since the Patna blasts—which kicked up a melee of finger-pointing and counter-accusations— the State’s security cover for Modi, Gujarat’s Chief Minister and the BJP’s prime ministerial candidate, has been tightened significantly. But the extent of the threat to his life is much more worrisome than is perceived, suggest intelligence inputs that Open has gained access to.

Central security agencies acknowledge that for Islamist forces, Modi is India’s No 1 target. ‘He faces a high degree of threat not just from IM but also from Pakistani groups that routinely collaborate with Indian operatives such as Lashkar-e-Toiba, Jaish-e-Mohammed, Harkat ul Mujahideen, Harkat ul Jihad Islami, Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan and Hizbul Mujahideen,’ says a government document.

STARTLING DISCLOSURES

The official assessment is backed by intelligence inputs that point to numerous plots to target Modi. These are some of the leads available with India’s agencies:

» Officials of Pakistan’s external intelligence agency, the ISI, held a meeting with Indian Sikh radicals residing at House No G 541, DHA, Phase 5, Lahore, on 26 October 2013, where ISI operatives motivated Sikh extremists, including Lakhbir Singh Rode and Jagtar Singh Tara, to assist in transporting explosives to India to create disturbances at Modi rallies.

» At an indoor meeting of the banned SIMI in Nepal, held at the office of the Islamic Sangh, Birat Nagar, Nepal, speakers said the need of the hour was to find faithfuls who were ready to “neutralise” Modi.

» A D-Company operative, Munna Jhingra, who is currently incarcerated in Thailand on drug charges, has told an associate in Pakistan that he would eliminate Modi upon his release from jail.

» Maulana Masood Azhar of the Jaish-e- Mohammed told his acolytes that Modi would be killed if he becomes India’s Prime Minister.

» IM leaders operating from Karachi are likely to depute trained cadres that would enter India to carry out fidayeen attacks on Modi.

» Pakistan-based IM terrorists are planning a terror strike in a prominent Indian city that Modi is likely to visit—such as Delhi, Mumbai, Ahmedabad or Surat.

» Zia ur Rehman alias Waqas, an IM operative picked up from Dhaka, has disclosed in his interrogation that Bhatkal and Asadullah Akhtar—both now in police custody—had discussed strikes on Modi.

THE PLOT THICKENS

Robert Spencer, founder of the blog Jihad Watch, tells Open that he has in his possession enough evidence to suggest that the jihadist threat to Indian nationalist leaders is “very big”. “They will do anything to kill them,” he says. Spencer has tracked jihadist movements across the world.

Bhatkal’s interrogation could have been used to extract more details of IM activities across the country. But it seems political apathy got in the way.

The IM leader’s arrest was supposed to be the biggest victory of the past couple of decades for Indian security agencies. Working with intelligence assets created in Nepal, by early August 2013, IB officials had traced Bhatkal’s exact location in Pokhara. However, to cross over, nab him and get him to Bihar, they needed around Rs 2 lakh. Time was crucial, and rather than going through the rigmarole of getting financial clearances from the IB headquarters, the sleuths informally arranged the money with the help of a police official posted at Raxaul.

Five days later, the IB team and Motihari’s Superintendent of Police drove back with Bhatkal, hoping to get as much information as possible out of him over the next 24 hours on IM operations and targets. The initial questioning soon after his arrest would have given his interrogators a tactical advantage, as a terror accused is psychologically most vulnerable in this period. Lack of judicial scrutiny tends to spook the most hardened of criminals, and they usually yield leads at the slightest exertion of psychological pressure. But this is where things went horribly wrong. As the Bihar police— under the instructions of Chief Minister Nitish Kumar(These sickular puckers are as much a security threat to India as Indian mujahideen)—refused to arrest Bhatkal, the IB sleuths were forced to bring in the National Investigation Agency (the IB has no power to arrest anyone). Unfortunately, a senior NIA officer, unable to keep the catch secret, tipped off the media. Though the officer was shifted out of the NIA later, enough damage had already been done: Bhatkal had to be produced rightaway before a magistrate after the news of his arrest appeared on TV. Once his questioning began under court scrutiny, Bhatkal became more confident and less cooperative. The interrogators were now met with carefully crafted responses like, “I am not feeling up to it” or “I have to offer namaaz” every time they began asking him questions.

But the Patna blasts at Modi’s rally on 27 October 2013 prompted the Centre to do a rethink. A panicky UPA Government issued an order to throw a ring of security around Modi on par with that of someone shielded by the Special Protection Group, which covers prime ministers and other top leaders.

All of Modi’s recent public meetings have seen a strict observance of ASL— short for ‘Advance Security liaison’—protocols (see graphic), a drill that is undertaken during visits of India’s President, Prime Minister and Congress President Sonia Gandhi. The order demanded that Modi be treated as an ASL protectee all over the country.

MAD PURSUIT

The significance of the IM threat came to light after the interrogation of David Coleman Headley, the man who scouted for targets of a jihadist attack on Mumbai that took place on 26 November 2008. He was the first to reveal to his US interrogators details of the so-called Karachi Project—a plot scripted by the ISI, involving retired and serving officers of the Pakistan army, to launch terror attacks on India through the use of Lashkar collaborators. Among the aims of this sinister plan, Indian cities were to be subjected to a series of terror attacks designed and directed by ISI-appointed handlers in Karachi but executed by IM operatives and passed off as cases of ‘homegrown terror’.

The probe of the Patna blasts has revealed how influential the IM is in Bihar. Tehsin Akhtar alias Monu, a leading member of the group’s Darbhanga module who is thought to have masterminded those blasts, had set up a network that stretched from Darbhanga, Madhubani, Sitamarhi and Samastipur in the state’s north to Aurangabad and Gaya in central Bihar. Monu, according to intelligence sources, was also behind the serial bomb blasts on the Mahabodhi Temple in Bodh Gaya in July, an act of terror scripted in retaliation to the alleged killings of Rohingya Muslims in Myanmar.

During their interrogation, members of the Patna attack module told the police that Tehsin Akhtar had instigated the group to carry out serial blasts. Said one, named Imtiaz: “Hamaara uddeshya thha ki aatank phaile aur bhaag daud mein kaafi sankhya mein mahilayein aur bachche marein” (Our objective was to spread terror so that women and children get killed in heavy numbers in the resultant stampede)This is touted as pissful religion in the world. According to Imtiaz, the stampede plan was Akhtar’s, who was present at Gandhi Maidan to supervise the bombers as they ringed the rally ground with explosives. “Muzaffarnagar mein bahut Muslim maare gaye hain, aur tum sirf namaaz hi padhte raho (Many Muslims got killed in Muzaffarnagar and all you do is to pray),” Tehsin exhorted his associates, according to one of those who planted the explosives.

TRAGEDY OF ERRORS

Ignoring intelligence inputs has been a curse in India right from the time of Mahatma Gandhi to that of former Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi. A retired police officer, who has served eight prime ministers as an SPG hand, tells Open of an incident that speaks of the callous approach to security that enabled the killing of Rajiv Gandhi by LTTE assassins.

Three days before the former PM’s assassination, the officer was on his way to Balia, hometown of the then Prime Minister Chandra Shekhar. When he reached platform No 2 of Patna Railway Station, he saw a slogan-shouting crowd surge ahead and about on Platform No 1, shunting aside everything in its way. Youthful Congress supporters and others were milling around, with arms and legs flailing and bodies bobbing to the crackle of slogans. There was palpable excitement in the air, as if it were a defining moment in India’s political history.

And then he saw Rajiv Gandhi being bumped from shoulder to excited shoulder. By force of habit, the former SPG officer’s instant thought—indeed worry— was of Gandhi’s security. Any one of the hundreds of hands in that mob reaching out to touch, shake his hand, or garland him could blow him to bits, he realised with a disconcerting sense of apprehension.

Three days later, after hours of hectic official engagements with the then Prime Minister, the former SPG official had barely retired to rest in Balia, at the PM’s house, when constables came banging on the door. There was shocking news. “Sir, the Congress president has been assassinated at Sriperambudur.” The apprehension had turned to reality.

“It was his extreme proximity to the public that made his security threat perception the most sensitive among many PMs,” says the former SPG official. Interestingly enough, speaking to a New York Times reporter on his way to his rally venue at Sriperambudur, Rajiv Gandhi had expanded on this, asserting that it was imperative for him to personally ask voters across India to return the Congress to power, even if it meant approaching people and interacting with them as if it were a local election. “I used to campaign like this before I became PM, now that I am no longer one, I’m going back to that,” the reporter later recalled him as saying. ‘They decked him in flowers. Minutes later, he was dead,’ wrote Barbara Crosette of The New York Times in her eyewitness account of Rajiv Gandhi’s murder at that rally on 21 May 1991, after the first phase of polling in that year’s General Election was over.

When Rajiv Gandhi was Prime Minister before his party lost power in the General Election of 1989, the SPG official was part of a special crack team of security personnel especially trained for the PM’s security. Then a junior officer, he had had several opportunities to interact directly with the PM.

As PM, Gandhi had participated actively in shaping this new expert security crew. Among his directives, he wanted their attire kept sober and uniform from its director down to every constable; this would signal an operational structure free of any rigid hierarchy that might hamper the flow of information from the ground to senior officers and vice-versa. Gandhi was also keen that the special agents in his security detail appear ordinary so as not to deter ordinary folk from getting close. In consonance with that, he also decided that the SPG would be armed only discreetly—unlike the Black Cat Commandos who would be seen wielding firearms in public to keep people at bay.

It was VP Singh—after assuming power in 1989 at the head of the National Front Government—who made 7 Race Course Road the PM’s official residence, where the SPG pitched an elaborate security camp. Singh, the SPG official recalls, had particularly strained relations with his protectors, even ascribing conspiratorial political motives to their heavy presence on the premises. It was also he who ordered that Gandhi be stripped of his SPG cover just two months after he stepped down as PM.

Keeping VIPs safe is a matter of utmost importance in any democracy. In a letter against the official probe of security lapses surrounding Rajiv Gandhi’s assasination, B Raman, a former additional director in the Cabinet Secretariat, had observed: ‘General Charles de Gaulle used to disregard the advice of his security officers. John F Kennedy went to Dallas in Texas despite intelligence reports of likely disruption of his visit by conservative and racist elements. French President Giscard d’Estaing was in the habit of driving at breakneck speed and was once involved in a serious collision with a milk van when he went out at night without informing the security. Indira Gandhi was disinclined to wear a bullet-proof vest. Swedish Prime Minister Olof Palme, who was killed in 1987, and his wife were in the habit of going for after-dinner walks without informing their security. When mishaps occur, the security bureaucracy cannot absolve itself of responsibility by claiming that the VIP invited trouble by not observing precautions. The bureaucracy is expected to protect him despite the VIP’s propensity for non-observance of precautions.’

THE VULNERABILITY OF MODI

Many international experts on terror believe it is only a matter of time that Modi becomes a target of trans-national Islamists operating in the Middle East, especially since they thrive on the spectacle such an attack would be. Says renowned author and military historian Edward Luttwak: “In the case of India, jihadists are both an organic expression of the Islamic legal doctrine that no Darr-ul Islam territory can ever be alienated to non-Muslim rule (regardless of the proportion of its non-Muslim population)—a doctrine promulgated by the Uttar Pradesh-based, tax-exempt Darul Uloom Deoband—and jihad is also an instrument of the Pakistani state; the former provides numbers, the latter specialised training.”He adds, “Both together mean that for India, jihadists are a strategic threat.” This means, he argues, that Modi is not only vulnerable to assassination but also to a temporary conquest of his political space by 26/11-style attackers.

Those tasked with safeguarding Modi agree that it is a challenge, but say they are leaving nothing to chance. According to a senior security official posted in Gandhinagar, the point is to make sure nothing is let slip even for a fraction of a moment. “Remember the statement issued by the Irish Republican Army on the attempt to kill Margaret Thatcher in 1984 at the Brighton Hotel?” he says, “The statement ended like this, ‘…You have to be lucky all the time. We have to be lucky only once’.”

That, he says, is the brutal truth.

[krishnan]

http://www.rediff.com/news/report/money ... 140425.htm

Out of the 100 million dollars (Rs 611 crore) sanctioned for terror activities in India, the Students Islamic Movement of India and the Indian Mujahideen have managed to lay their hands on 20 million dollars (Rs 122 cr), say sources in the Intelligence Bureau.

[sum]

Working with intelligence assets created in Nepal, by early August 2013, IB officials had traced Bhatkal’s exact location in Pokhara. However, to cross over, nab him and get him to Bihar, they needed around Rs 2 lakh. Time was crucial, and rather than going through the rigmarole of getting financial clearances from the IB headquarters, the sleuths informally arranged the money with the help of a police official posted at Raxaul.

Five days later, the IB team and Motihari’s Superintendent of Police drove back with Bhatkal, hoping to get as much information as possible out of him over the next 24 hours on IM operations and targets.

Hope these nameless heroes are given their due recognition when a actual non-sickular "nationalist" GoI takes oath on 16th May

[SRoy]

MHA blocks CRPF ‘restructuring’ plan

MHA blocks CRPF ‘restructuring’ plan
Tuesday, 15 April 2014 | Rakesh K Singh | New Delhi

Trivedi’s proposal would have led to regionalism

The Union Home Ministry has put a spanner in CRPF chief Dilip Trivedi’s outlandish proposal of doing away with the age-old annual changeover policy by putting in place a zonal system wherein the personnel were proposed to be restricted to their home State all through their career, compromising the all-India character of the Force and limiting the exposure of the paramilitary personnel.

Acting on an anonymous letter citing the drawbacks of the proposed re-organisation policy of the CRPF Director General that would have entailed an annual cost on transfers to the tune of `260 crore to the exchequer and loss of eight lakh man days,

Union Home Secretary Anil Goswami held a meeting with the paramilitary top brass, including Trivedi on April 7 and issued orders putting the decision on hold.

The proposed re-organisation would have involved transfer of over 80,000 personnel in the ongoing fiscal and was seen to be fraught with reduction of the paramilitary to the level of a police force. The move could have also led to creation of regionalism and vested interests within the rank and file besides negatively affecting the concept of regimentation.

The anonymous letter titled, “Damaging the Basic Structure of CRPF — Answers Awaited”, was addressed to the Union Home Minister Sushil Kumar Shinde who is learnt to have asked Goswami to resolve the issues raised therein. Goswami has also ordered to constitute a committee to examine the issues highlighted by the letter apparently written by an experienced cadre officer of the CRPF. During the meeting, Goswami is said to have flagged concerns over the move for which prior approval from the Ministry was not sought.

The re-organisation policy included a single command system in conjunction with area of responsibility (AOR). The paramilitary organisation was proposed to be divided into four zones — Northern, South, East and Central — and the proposal to post non-gazetted officers in the home division could have compromised the fighting capabilities of the personnel owing to limited area of responsibility.

Trivedi refused to comment over the MHA’s move to scrap his controversial proposal. As the BSF chief also earlier, Trivedi, an IPS officer, had sought to tinker with the annual changeover policy, a move thoroughly resisted by the rank and file of the force. The Union Home Ministry subsequently scrapped his idea.

The letter has underscored that idea was pushed through by Trivedi despite opposition from both cadre and IPS officers — including then Special DG DK Pathak who has subsequently been promoted as DG of the BSF.

“Overruling Government decisions and all suggestions from officers (both CRPF and IPS), the DG (Trivedi) along with a group of officers in the Directorate of CRPF have ordered the re-affiliation and transfer policies. It is felt that these measures are detrimental to the interest of the nation as well as to CRPF personnel. One officer of the rank of Special DG (DK Pathak), who had experience of CRPF at various levels and formations, had joined BSF when he was belittled for sticking to logical analysis, which is also supported by maximum number of officers,” the letter said.

During an internal meeting of the CRPF before the proposal for re-organisation was approved by the paramilitary, Pathak is learnt to have pointed out that the communal riots in Assam were controlled only because of the national character of the CRPF as the local police was reluctant in taking action against All Assam Students’ Union.

This guy needs to be monitored. I'm sure we will hear more about him in near future as a AAP candidate/member or part of some NGO.

[ramana]

How was such a massive reorganisation pushed by just one person? Usually reorgs are by a panel
something is wrong.

[sum]

X-post:

^^ In "secular" Ktaka, we have the spectacle where a anti-Naxal force team intercepts a truck during routine checking for Naxals and all the people in the truck start running helter skelter. ANF folks think they are maoists and fire on them killing one. Turns out that they were from a "certain community" and illegaly smuggling cattle which caused them to panic when stopped.

The matter rests there until "NGOs" start their usual tamasha raking up "minority rights violations" and now the poor constable( who won a gallantry medal last year) is arrested while there are reports that the ANF folks are really unhappy at this and might resosrt to some sort of strike.

Karnataka police register FIR, detain constable

Nearly five days after a 23-year-old youth was killed by the Anti-Naxal Force (ANF) after being suspected of being a Naxalite, Karnataka police have registered an FIR and detained the constable who fired the shots at Mohammed Kabeer in the pre-dawn hours of April 19 at the Thanikodu checkpost on the Sringeri-Karkala route.

ANF police constable Naveen G Naik, a recipient of the 2012 President’s Gallantry medal for anti-Naxal operations, has been detained at the Sringeri police station following a complaint by Umar Farooq, one of the three other persons who were in the pick-up truck along with Kabeer when it was stopped at the check post for inspection by a joint team of local police officials and the ANF personnel at 3:30 am on April 19.

The ANF has claimed that Kabeer was killed after he and his associates acted suspiciously and tried to flee the scene when confronted by the police team.

The ANF said its personnel suspected the men to be Naxals, leading constable Naik to open fire from his AK-47.

Police sources said Naik had been booked under Section 302 of the Indian Penal Code. He has been detached from the ANF operation and asked to report to the Sringeri police station, an official said.

The officials claimed that they wer awaiting orders from senior police officers to produce the constable in a jurisdictional court. Meanwhile, the ANF has reportedly put its force on alert following intelligence inputs that the sensitive episode might be used to orchestrate an attack on them by the Naxals.

[sum]

This is how INC ensures that we are never secure:
ANF calls off night-time patrolling after cop arrest

The over-400 strong Anti-Naxal Force of the Karnataka police have called off night time patrolling and ambush activities in the forests of the Western Ghats region of the state in the light of a drop in morale of the force following the arrest of an ANF constable for the killing of a 23-year-old Muslim youth.

Though home minister K J George and the head of the Internal Security Division Amar Kumar Pandey have denied any halt in the activities of the ANF stationed in the forested hills of the Chikamagalur-Dakshina Kannada region, sources familiar with developments in the ANF said night time patrolling and combing activities had come to a halt with only the occassional day time patrols being carried out over the last couple of days since the arrest of the ANF constable Naveen G Naik for shooting Mohammed Kabeer.

“Combing operations are being carried out only once a day due to the lack of enthusiasm among the personnel, especially the constable cadre. Senior officials have been confronted by juniors and told that restraining the use of arms would make the ANF sitting ducks during combing operations,” an official said. Senior officials have also decided following the incident of April 19 to employ the ANF only if Naxal activity is spotted in the area, police sources said.

The state police had initially resisted the arrest of Naik for opening fire on Kabeer and his associates from fear that it would affect the morale of the ANF if the firing was justified and done in the line of duty.

Naik was however arrested on April 25 following growing pressure from within the ruling Congress in Karnataka, civil rights groups and the State Human Rights Commission for justice for the family of the victim along with the Rs 10 lakh compensation announced for the kin of the victim by the state government.

So a cattle smuggler gets 10 lakh compensation and a gallantry award winning constable goes to jail for doing his duty.
Mera Bharat mahaan.

[SanjayC]

^^^ There is a strong gang of Naxal supporters in Congress. This gang comes hard on police whenever they begin to achieve some success against Naxals. The same gang is responsible for setting up NAC and inserting Binayak Sen into advisory positions to Government. Modi will put a stop to this treachery.

[chetak]

Why Major Mukund and his body guards had to die?

28/04/2014 13:30:28



Even the sketchy reports of the Encounter at Shopian's Karewa suggest that the Local Population jeopardizes the lives of the Indian Security Forces.

As soon as Islamist militants are spotted, the local villagers do their briefing by the mullahs who sermon them to act as Human Shields and get in between the thick of the battle.

The Standard instructions of Indian Army operating against Islamist Insurgents hiding in civilian enclaves- the No Civilian Collateral as paramount is getting exploited to the hilt.

Not only locals rush to the scene of battle from surrounding villages shouting anti Indian and Pro-Pakistani slogans, they also intimidate the Army men with the risk of Collateral Civilian Casualties.


USE OF AERIAL VEHICLES AND REAL TIME CAMERA FEEDS

There are plenty of relatively cheap Technological Gizmos that can help save precious lives of our Officers and Jawans.

In this encounter, the Insurgents first got tactical advantage from Locals who diverted the Focus and threatened them with Collateral Civilian casualties.

Aerial Surveillance by Miniature Aerial droids would have cut them off by cordoning.
The Major had ventured into the demolished hole of the Terrorists.

A surviving lone terrorist ambushed the team killing Major Mukund and his two body guards.

The Real time Aerial surveillance would have alerted the lone wolf by infra red signature. He could have been forced into surrender or buried there with more fire.
Instead we keep losing our men.


TREAT WILLFUL HUMAN SHIELDS AS LEGITIMATE TARGETS TO BE DEGRADED


In this encounter the report further reads-

"Clashes between government forces and locals erupted near Narpora village after people from Drubgam and its adjacent villages tried to move towards the encounter site after the news of killing of the local militant spread in the area.

As the encounter concluded, scores of youth from different villages took to streets and started chanting pro-freedom and anti-India slogans. The chairman of United Jihad Council (UJC) Syed Salahuddin on Saturday paid rich tributes to militants who were killed during an encounter in South Kashmir’s Karewa area in Shopian district."

One way to save the precious lives of our Uniformed patriots, is to tax the treacherous civilian populace with Consequences of entering the Conflict for the Pakistani insurgency. By showing less restraint and more care for its own men's lives.

Let the Human Rights Vultures scream as shrill as they please- Dont spare the traitor crowd your bullets.

If you they act as a Human Shield, then bust and shatter that- and reach the enemy of our nation hiding behind- whatever be the cost to be paid not by the men who shed blood for this Nation but the wolves who bleed her and house the wolf.

Waste them.

[Sachin]

So a cattle smuggler gets 10 lakh compensation and a gallantry award winning constable goes to jail for doing his duty.

How is the local vernacular Kannada media showing this sad episode? Naxal friendly and cattle smuggler friendly reporting is more prevalent? The fact that the ANF is now losing its morale should be picked by the BJP folks and given a huge publicity. In neighbouring Kerala, last week a constable who was leading the Naxal search has been threatened by the naxals, who seems to be camping in the forest. The constable was threatened to be killed. At least from what I could read in the media, the police was not criticized or cowed down yet. All police stations nearing forest area now have additional men with automatic weapons posted in (as addl. strength).

[chetak]

^^^ There is a strong gang of Naxal supporters in Congress. This gang comes hard on police whenever they begin to achieve some success against Naxals. The same gang is responsible for setting up NAC and inserting Binayak Sen into advisory positions to Government. Modi will put a stop to this treachery.

This has only increased after the new home minister george has taken over

would any other major state allow a non local as HM??

[Anand K]

It seems like the Roopesh-Shyna wonder couple and core team comprising of a Mahatao, a "Kanya Kumari" and a couple of others have been traveling all over Wayanadu district at will, evading cordons of cops and IB. This is while dozens of hard-core naxals have been reported to infiltrate the cities in the guise of out-of-state labor.

Well, the leading lights have been under pursuit for 3 years now, highly curtailed due to bandobasts, and given the Kerala situation I don't think they are going to succeed. Not unless malcontents and extremist social-activists actually flock to it's banner in numbers. Now there are a number of Land Rights and Occupation movements across the state and statistically there should be a few dozen hardcore members for the picking. Like, if there are people who could make bows & arrows and kill a cop in Muthanga, the same pool can be used for a better funded gang.

[vishvak]

So a cattle smuggler gets 10 lakh compensation and a gallantry award winning constable goes to jail for doing his duty.

My India secular. In fact no so-called seculars are coming out to question smuggling of cattle or compensation for cattle smuggler.

[sum]

The fact that the ANF is now losing its morale should be picked by the BJP folks and given a huge publicity.

Local BJP units, esp in that belt, have been going hammer and tongs at this issue but the papers are only reporting it as "BJP communalises issue"!