archive: The blast was waiting to happen
The blast was waiting to happen
Statesman News Service
The Statesman
June 24, 1999
Title: The blast was waiting to happen
Author: Statesman News Service
Publication: The Statesman
Date: June 24, 1999
SILIGURI, June 23. - Local authorities, wishing to remain
unidentified, confided to The Statesman today that they had been
alerted, through "official channels" about an impending terrorist
attack in North Bengal, similar to the one in New Jalpaiguri station
yesterday.
The fact that the attack "was waiting to happen" raises questions
about the authorities' preparedness. Yesterday's explosion showed it
was totally wanting.
According to a railway security officer who witnessed the explosion,
there had been no recent instructions to beef up security at the
station. The question becomes more pointed in the light of the
incident at Falakata in Cooch Behar, where bombs had been found under
the railway tracks, just a day earlier.
Sources in intelligence asserted that North Bengal was no longer a
"corridor" for ISI agents. Rather, the region had turned into a base
for foreign subversives.
Delhi police had arrested a ISI agent, Syed Abu Nasir, on 7 January.
Nasir had been pushed into Siliguri from Bangladesh by the ISI, a
Union home ministry report was to reveal later.
Nasir was interrogated by the FBI, on the suspicion that he was
preparing to bomb US embassies in India at the behest of Osama bin
Laden. He was found to have "good access" to Azam Cheema and
Zaki-ur-Rehman, top leaders of Lashkar-e-Toiba. Members of the
militant outfit are believed to be among the intruders in Kargil.
Only last December, a group of 13 Pakhtoon money lenders was picked up
from Siliguri on suspicion of being ISI agents. Subsequently, a
couple of locals were arrested, also on the suspicion that they were
acting as ISI agents: a girl studying law at North Bengal University,
and a school teacher from Bagdogra. The latter was arrested only last
week.
The ISI's modus operandi is to lure prospective agents with money and
"nice things of life", the sources said. If later these people are
unwilling, they are blackmailed into working for the agency.
There are so many ISI agents in the area, the sources said, that they
could have easily executed the bomb attack on their own - without any
help from the Ulfa or any other outfit seeking self-determination.
The Kishanganj-Islampur area, the chicken neck measuring about 25 km
in width, is "saturated" with ISI men, sources say. A madrassa in
Kishanganj has been attracting a lot of attention lately for its
"suspicious" activities. The madrassa, reportedly out of bounds for
outsiders, has been getting a lot of foreign funds. It is also said to
have bought land close to Siliguri.
The large number of illegal migrants from the neighbouring country
makes the area a happy hunting ground for the ISI. The demographic
pattern has undergone a significant change in the past few years
because of the influx, thanks to political parties and their "vote
banks".
In Siliguri, the areas "under surveillance" include Champasari,
Dangipara, the latter being in the heart of the town.
The North Bengal corridor became "more busy" after the ISI began to
shift bases to Nepal from Bangladesh, in the wake of New Delhi's
improving relations with Dhaka. The demographic pattern in the
Terai-Nepal region, including Damak, has reportedly changed markedly
too.
But the most distressing piece of information is that the ISI has also
made a base in Jorethang, a town bordering Sikkim and Bengal. Sources
say the Pakistani intelligence agency is pushing its operations into
Sikkim, getting closer to the Chinese border.
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