While keeping an eagle eye on the western border with Pakistan and the northern and northeastern borders with China for decades, India may have taken it a bit easy on its eastern and northeastern borders with Bangladesh and Myanmar. That will have to change.
The Manipur border with Myanmar is already an extended battle zone in the conflict between Meiteis and Kukis. The infiltration of Chin-Kuki militants from Myanmar with sophisticated drones and rockets has made the situation explosive. While the drones have a small payload capacity, the rockets which can fly 6-7 km to their target are of particular concern.
Manipur’s security adviser Kuldiep Singh last week flagged the immediate likelihood of 900 Chin-Kuki militants sneaking into India.
Combing operations in the villages bordering Myanmar have started. India has also decided to fence the treacherously porous 1,643 km Myanmar border spending Rs 31,000 crore.
But an uglier challenge lurks on the border of a highly unstable Bangladesh after mobs overthrew the increasingly autocratic Sheikh Hasina regime on August 5. The ‘coup’ has created a security vacuum in Bangladesh.
Although US-backed Muhammad Yunus has been installed as the head of the caretaker government, the country has slid into mobocracy with the police largely off the streets and the army unwilling to crack down hard on miscreants. Prisoners have escaped from Bangladesh jails, including Jamaat militants. Islamists are on the rampage, and attacks on minorities have been vicious and relentless.
Indian intelligence inputs are ominous.
In Sylhet’s Ambarkhana, Pakistani Jamaat elements and ISI operatives have apparently landed. Similar Pakistani activity has been noticed in the Brahmanbaria district.
The Assam-Meghalaya border is likely to become sensitive in the coming days, as well as areas around Gangasagar which borders Bangladesh.
The BSF has been cautioned about armed militants from Bangladesh likely to enter India. Several cameras have been stolen by Bangladeshis along the fence. There have been instances lately of the BSF firing to stop infiltration.
But vigil has not been watertight. There are inputs, for instance, about radical Mufti Mahmodul Hasan Zubayer alias Zubayer Rahmani crossing over to India through Haridaspur in Bongaon, West Bengal. He is brazenly carrying out anti-India propaganda on social media, supporting anti-India elements and insurgents, calling for a boycott of Indian products, and floating separatist demands in the Northeast’s seven-sister states.
Zubayer has visited Islamic institutions in Delhi and probably Darul Uloom Deoband in UP as well. He is linked to Mohammed Jasimuddin Rahmani, the chief of Ansarullah Bangla Team, who was released from a Bangladesh jail recently.
India has to think smart, move fast, and act decisively. Islamists in Bangladesh have a free run right now, and they are internationally well-connected with jihad catalysts like ISI and the Muslim Brotherhood. They have a plan and are working on mission mode to weaken India.
India can either be defensive or use this period of chaos in Bangladesh to its own advantage. Simply watching events unfold is not an option.
Abhijit Majumder is a senior journalist. Views expressed in the above piece are personal and solely those of the author. They do not necessarily reflect News18’s views.
Comments
0 comment