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Author: Anand Soondas
Publication: The Times of India
Date: October 19, 2005
Introduction: With 40-50% Indian bunkers destroyed, 400 rebels easily cross over for subversion
The Indian government, effusive at reports of terrorist camps being destroyed in Muzaffarabad after the October 8 earthquake, went to town with the news. What it hasn't said is that there may be close to 400 terrorists lurking around J&K right now, looking for targets that suddenly seem soft in the aftermath of the disaster.
In a startling revelation, a top intelligence officer told TOI on Tuesday that softening of the border, more porous than ever after the quake, has already begun to boomerang on India. "In fact, so ridiculous is the situation that about 60 terrorists injured in the earthquake in Muzaffarabad are trying to reach Srinagar for treatment," he said.
Eighty per cent of the terrorists belong to the Lashkar-e-Toiba and the rest are from the Hizbul Mujahideen and Jaish-e-Mohammad. "But these two terrorists groups, encouraged by the diversion of attention and effort to deal with the earthquake and its victims, are trying to push in as many terrorists as they can," the officer said.
There are three crucial factors for the rise in infiltration now. First is the fact that 40-50% of the bunkers and posts on the Indian side of the LoC are damaged or turned into rubble. The figure is 70-80% on the Pakistan side. The BSF lost a "lot of posts" in the Uri sector, one of its senior officers said.
The other aspect is the empathy factor Both Pakistan and India are going slow on checks at the border Many Indians who went to Pakistan on the Srinagar-Muzaffarabad bus just walked back into India. At Tarboni, one of the last Indian villages before the LoC in the Kupwara sector, local residents told TOI that their Pakistani relatives have come to India for treatment. "This is not the time to be strict about these things," Mustafa Mir said in Tangdhar. There are also reports of people from the other side of the LoC coming to border villages like Kamalkote in the Uri sector.
The third reason could be the indoctrinated feeling among terrorists that those 11 martyred" for 'jehad' during the holy month of Ramadan get a straight ticket to heaven. "This is the best time for the fidayeen to die," the intelligence officer said. "Militant leaders are taking advantage of this and instigating their cadres to carry out more strikes."
Army officers accept that there has been a diversion of priority and effort after the earthquake. They said while they are dealing with rescue and relief operations, a considerable amount of thought and strategy is going into how to resurrect the bunkers and deal with lost lives of its own men. More than 90 security officers and soldiers have died in the earthquake.
Happiness over terrorists killed and their camps destroyed in PoK was clearly premature. There have been at least six incidents of attacks in the state after the earthquake. Four soldiers of the 158 Territorial Army died in a single day, on October 15, when two fidayeen dressed in Army fatigues barged into their unit at Kathua, Jammu.
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