To add to the list of its ‘glories’, the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI), scoffed today as Congress Bureau of Investigation, has also freed Bofors kickback case accused Ottavio Quattrocchi by striking off his name from its list of most wanted persons. Quattrocchi is an Italian businessman and said to be a friend of the Rajiv Gandhi family — with a patent pointer to Sonia Gandhi’s Italian roots. It has now come to light that the 12-year Interpol red corner notice, or lookout notice, was taken off from the wanted section of the agency’s website reportedly on the legal advice of Attorney General Milon Banerjee. In the wake of the development and clean chit to Quattrocchi, the BJP and the Left have charged the Congress with frantic efforts to bury the investigation against him for obvious reasons. Even a former CBI director, Joginder Singh, has joined in, saying that the CBI had proof of Quattrocchi receiving $7.32 million as kickback in the Bofors case. However, the Congress has refuted the charges — the expedient argument being that nothing could be proved against the Italian businessman, implying thereby that the CBI has ultimately done a wonderful job by freeing an ‘innocent’ person. So what better godsend for the Congress, given that key figures in the case such as arms dealer Win Chaddha and former defence secretary SK Bhatnagar are already dead! But the question remains: Does the CBI today have any credibility worth the name? THE SENTINEL
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The BDR Menace
As we reported on Wednesday, an intelligence input that some Bangladesh Rifles (BDR) mutineers, who have gone missing after the uprising in February, have come to the aid of ULFA cadres along the Indo-Myanmar border has been dispatched to New Delhi. Intelligence sources told this newspaper that ‘‘our input is clear that 27-28 well-trained BDR men are imparting training to ULFA cadres along the Indo-Myanmar border’’ and that ‘‘the ULFA has new instructors and the Bangladesh Army is not aware of these new developments.’’ At the same time a former BDR chief, Lt Gen (retd) Atiqur Rahman, has told the Dhaka-based Daily Star that the ammunition and explosives that went missing during the troopers’ mutiny could have been smuggled to militant groups in India’s northeastern region, including to the ULFA. According to the Daily Star, both the BDR authorities and intelligence and other law-enforcing agencies ‘‘are worried about the missing weapons, mainly about grenades, as those might fall in the hands of terrorists and other criminals causing threats to the country’s security’’.
The threat is two-fold: 1) the ULFA getting a new assortment of armoury and fresh training from the BDR deserters to unleash a new variety of terror against the people of Asom to prove its capabilities and sustainability despite the reverses of the day, and 2) the jihadi terror outfits of Bangladesh, especially the Harkat-ul Jihadi Islami (HuJI), clinching a deal with the BDR deserters towards the ownership of the missing ammunition and explosives — to be used in perpetrating terror not only on Bangladesh to destabilize the moderate and anti-fundamentalist dispensation of Sheikh Hasina Wazed, but also on India in league with the many sleeper cells and modules that are in place in the country under the expert guidance and patronage of home-grown jihadi outfits like the Indian Mujahideen and Students Islamic Federation of India (SIMI). If the theory is that the BDR mutineers are bailing out the ULFA, in need of a fresh stock of arsenal, for financial rewards which the outfit can easily provide out of its coffers built over the years from the loot extracted from Asom in the form of extortion and, of course, in the name of ‘revolution’ for the Asomiyas to free them from the Indian ‘colonial’ occupation, it can be equally argued that the ULFA-BDR mutineers camaraderie is just a continuation of their wonderful strategic partnership of the past. Therefore, it is not strangers coming together for instant gains but friends of the past reaching out to each other in the times of need. As for the jihadi outfits benefiting from the missing BDR ammunition and explosives, the same argument holds true; after all, the rank and file of the BDR has been notorious for its tacit understanding with and sympathy for the fundamentalist forces of that country as well as for laying the red carpet for ISI rogues in their mission to destabilize India’s Northeast, especially Asom. It is true, to quote former French President Jacques Chirac, that ‘‘terrorism has become the systematic weapon of a war that knows no borders or seldom has a face’’, but here in Asom we know that the face of the borderless scourge called terrorism is increasingly visible, be it the ULFA, the various jihadi outfits in Bangladesh with whom the ULFA has had a successful innings of strategic partnership, or the BDR mutineers who have now come down to their real self. THE SENTINEL
.
The BDR Menace
As we reported on Wednesday, an intelligence input that some Bangladesh Rifles (BDR) mutineers, who have gone missing after the uprising in February, have come to the aid of ULFA cadres along the Indo-Myanmar border has been dispatched to New Delhi. Intelligence sources told this newspaper that ‘‘our input is clear that 27-28 well-trained BDR men are imparting training to ULFA cadres along the Indo-Myanmar border’’ and that ‘‘the ULFA has new instructors and the Bangladesh Army is not aware of these new developments.’’ At the same time a former BDR chief, Lt Gen (retd) Atiqur Rahman, has told the Dhaka-based Daily Star that the ammunition and explosives that went missing during the troopers’ mutiny could have been smuggled to militant groups in India’s northeastern region, including to the ULFA. According to the Daily Star, both the BDR authorities and intelligence and other law-enforcing agencies ‘‘are worried about the missing weapons, mainly about grenades, as those might fall in the hands of terrorists and other criminals causing threats to the country’s security’’.
The threat is two-fold: 1) the ULFA getting a new assortment of armoury and fresh training from the BDR deserters to unleash a new variety of terror against the people of Asom to prove its capabilities and sustainability despite the reverses of the day, and 2) the jihadi terror outfits of Bangladesh, especially the Harkat-ul Jihadi Islami (HuJI), clinching a deal with the BDR deserters towards the ownership of the missing ammunition and explosives — to be used in perpetrating terror not only on Bangladesh to destabilize the moderate and anti-fundamentalist dispensation of Sheikh Hasina Wazed, but also on India in league with the many sleeper cells and modules that are in place in the country under the expert guidance and patronage of home-grown jihadi outfits like the Indian Mujahideen and Students Islamic Federation of India (SIMI). If the theory is that the BDR mutineers are bailing out the ULFA, in need of a fresh stock of arsenal, for financial rewards which the outfit can easily provide out of its coffers built over the years from the loot extracted from Asom in the form of extortion and, of course, in the name of ‘revolution’ for the Asomiyas to free them from the Indian ‘colonial’ occupation, it can be equally argued that the ULFA-BDR mutineers camaraderie is just a continuation of their wonderful strategic partnership of the past. Therefore, it is not strangers coming together for instant gains but friends of the past reaching out to each other in the times of need. As for the jihadi outfits benefiting from the missing BDR ammunition and explosives, the same argument holds true; after all, the rank and file of the BDR has been notorious for its tacit understanding with and sympathy for the fundamentalist forces of that country as well as for laying the red carpet for ISI rogues in their mission to destabilize India’s Northeast, especially Asom. It is true, to quote former French President Jacques Chirac, that ‘‘terrorism has become the systematic weapon of a war that knows no borders or seldom has a face’’, but here in Asom we know that the face of the borderless scourge called terrorism is increasingly visible, be it the ULFA, the various jihadi outfits in Bangladesh with whom the ULFA has had a successful innings of strategic partnership, or the BDR mutineers who have now come down to their real self. THE SENTINEL
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