Cover story: July 7 2012 The Secret Plot to blame India

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July 16, 2012

The Secret Plot to Blame India

Jundal's arrest exposes Pak's agenda of turning 26/11 into an Indian conspiracy

Sandeep Unnithan  July 7, 2012 | UPDATED 21:28 IST

 

On May 21, 2009, Ajmal Amir Kasab, the sole surviving Pakistani gunman from the 26/11 attack, was giving evidence in the court of Justice M.L. Tahaliyani at Mumbai's Arthur Road prison. Suddenly, he dropped a name. The person, he said, who had been their principal guide during the 60-hour operation from a control room in Karachi was Abu Jundal. No one in India had heard this name. Some were puzzled. Prosecution lawyer Ujjwal Nikam believed it was misinformation. And, as so often, the name Abu Jundal disappeared into a file.

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Three years later, on June 21, 2012, Saudi Arabia bundled a wanted Lashkar-e-Toiba (LeT) operative, Syed Zabiuddin Ansari, 30, on a plane and sent him to New Delhi. Ansari had more than one alias; among them was Abu Jundal. When Kasab, from his Mumbai cell, heard that Abu Jundal had been deported by the Saudis and was a captive in India, he became, say his jailors, contemplative. The final pieces of a complex puzzle was coming together. Perhaps the most deceptive element in the exhaustive planning that had gone into the barbaric terrorist attack on Mumbai, conceived by the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) and implemented by LeT, was a poisonous sting in the tail. When the horror that took 166 lives was over, the ISI wanted to leave behind enough false trails to implicate Indians for its most spectacular offensive against India.

DEADLY DECEPTIONS ISI wanted to leave enough red herrings to implicate Indians in the 26/11 attack Fake identities: The attackers carried ID cards of Arunodaya College, Hyderabad. The college is genuine but the ID cards were fake. Threads of distractions:LeT plotter David Headley purchased wristbands for all 10 attackers at Mumbai's Siddhivinayak temple. Blame it on Indians:'Kharak Singh from India' bought the Internet calling service used by LeT handlers. His IP address was in Pakistan. Lies on live television:"We're from Hyderabad. Don't you know Hyderabad? Don't you know your country?" attacker Fahadullah told a TV channel. Numbers game: All 10 terrorists were given mobile phones with Indian SIM cards by LeT's communications chief Zarar Shah.

It was a plot in which Ansari was a key protagonist. Born in Gevrai village in Maharashtra's Beed district, he completed his matriculation and did an Industrial Training Institute course to become an electrician. He became an anti-India radical after the 2002 Gujarat riots and went into the shadows of terrorism, first joining the Students Islamic Movement of India (SIMI), then the LeT.
Ansari came on the police radar for another plot against India, in transporting a shipment of 43 kg of RDX, 16 AK-47 assault rifles and 50 hand grenades to Aurangabad in 2006. This shipment, meant for a terror attack, was intercepted by the Maharashtra police. Under pressure, Ansari contacted LeT and fled to Pakistan. His name entered the public domain when the Indian Government handed over a list of 50 Most Wanted Fugitives to the Pakistani authorities in March 2007.
But Ansari was proving to be an invaluable asset for the LeT. A highly committed operative, he knew the layout of the land and directed terrorists during the attack on Mumbai on November 26, 2008. He was involved in plotting the blast at Pune's German Bakery on February 13, 2010, that killed 17 people. But still, India did not know of his role in the 26/11 attack. The breakthrough came in May 2010 when the Delhi Police intercepted a call from an India-based terrorist, Ajmal, who was in touch with his Pakistani handler. Ajmal had planned an attack on foreigners during the Commonwealth Games in Delhi that year. He referred to his handler as Abu Jundal. The agencies tracked Jundal down inside Pakistan. He was using the alias of Riyasat Ali and shuttled between LeT's headquarters in Muridke, near Lahore, and Karachi. Then they made a stunning discovery. Jundal, Riyasat Ali and Zabiuddin Ansari were the same person. Now they waited for their target to travel out of Pakistan.
In early 2011, Pakistan issued a passport to him, and sent him to Saudi Arabia to recruit potential jihadis from Indian labourers on behalf of LeT. In the oil-rich port of Dammam, Ansari ran a small taxi rental business, posing as Pakistani national Riyasat Ali. The US intelligence alerted the Saudis about Ansari's terrorist links; Riyadh put him under surveillance. Meanwhile, New Delhi provided the Arab kingdom with proof that Riyasat Ali was Zabiuddin Ansari, an LeT operative and originally an Indian citizen. DNA samples of his relatives were sent to the Saudi government even as the home ministry provided evidence of Ansari's involvement in the Aurangabad arms haul case. Islamabad, fearing that his deportation could explode their ploy of deniability, still maintained that he was a Pakistani citizen and wanted him back.

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But the Saudis interrogated Ansari and discovered that he was indeed an LeT operative. They had to take a call. Should they stand by their long-time ally Pakistan and let Ansari remain in Dammam or stand by international law and hand him over to India? The Kingdom chose India.
At a safe house of the Delhi Police's Special Cell in the Capital's Lodhi colony, Ansari has been telling his interrogators details of the secret plot at the core of the deadly attack on Mumbai. The intent was to land a double sucker punch. The first blow would devastate Mumbai. The second blow would, with just enough 'evidence', promote conspiracy theories among a section of media, opinion makers and political leaders that Hindu militants were behind the carnage.

Hemant Karkare during the 26/11 attack.

The conspiracy theorists didn't let Pakistan down. "There is more to it than meets the eye," former Maharashtra chief minister Abdul Rehman Antulay said outside the Lok Sabha on December 18, 2008, about the death of Maharashtra Anti-Terrorism Squad chief Hemant Karkare. Karkare, Additional Commissioner Ashok Kamte and Inspector Vijay Salaskar had been ambushed and killed by Ajmal Kasab and his accomplice Ismail Khan on November 26, 2008. Karkare was probing the Malegaon blasts, which had resulted in the arrests of Hindu fringe elements such as Lt-Col Shrikant Prasad Purohit, Sadhvi Pragya Thakur and Swami Aseemanand. Much of the Urdu press in India placed the blame for the attack on a diabolical Zionist-RSS nexus. Aziz Burney, group editor of leading Urdu newspaper Roznama Rashtriya Sahara blamed Hindu extremists. 'Is there any connection between the 26/11 attack and the Malegaon terror attack?' screamed a headline in the daily on November 29. 'This is a joint terror operation by Sangh Parivar and Mossad' said the Urdu Times of November 30, 2008. On December 5, Roznama Rashtriya Sahara ran another story: 'Who do you believe, Kasab the terrorist, or Karkare the martyr?' The paper hinted that the 26/11 attack was the work of Hindu fundamentalists and an elaborate plot to silence Karkare. 'Hindu terrorists are behind Mumbai attacks' said the Akhbare Mashriq on December 6, 2008. In September 2009, a retired Maharashtra inspector-general of police, S.M. Mushrif, in his book Who Killed Karkare?, blamed the Intelligence Bureau and Hindu extremists for 26/11.

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The conspiracy theory was also enthusiastically bought by politicians who wanted to mine the Muslim vote. On December 6, 2010, senior Congress leader and former Madhya Pradesh chief minister Digvijaya Singh released Burney's book26/11-RSS ki Saazish, which accused the RSS of planning and executing the 26/11 attack. Five days later, Singh claimed that Karkare had rung him up hours before he was gunned down and complained about threats and pressure from radical Hindu groups.
Ansari's confessions have further unravelled the secret Pakistani plot. He told interrogators of his role in teaching the 26/11 attackers Hindi. He would give them Hindi magazines and conduct conversations with them to sharpen their language skills before they left Karachi. He taught the attackers to blend into India-greet people with a proper 'namaste', maintain a low profile and be polite to women. There were other aspects to this smokescreen-the terrorists were made to wear sacred red threads bought for Rs.20 each by LeT scout David Coleman Headley from Mumbai's Siddhivinayak temple. All 10 terrorists carried fake identity cards of Arunodaya College, located in Hyderabad. They also took Hindu names. Ajmal Kasab became Sameer Choudhary and Ismail Khan was Naraish Verma. An LeT operative pretended to be 'Kharak Singh from India' and purchased Internet calling services from a US-based firm for $250 (Rs.10,000). The terrorists were told to communicate with their Karachi-based handlers using phones with Indian SIM cards.
The LeT, according to Ansari, monitored the attack from a specially created military-style command and control centre in Karachi, which was visited by LeT leaders and ISI officials. The control room had multiple television sets tuned into Indian TV channels, satellite telephones and computers. The handlers-Sajid Mir, Abu Al Qama, Abu Qahafa and Muzzammil-maintained constant communication with the 10 terrorists. Ansari tutored two of the LeT terrorists who had stormed into Nariman House on what to tell the Indian media in Hindi. He asked them to impersonate disgruntled Muslim youth. While doing this, he used a Hindi wordprashaasan (administration). Indian intelligence agencies who tapped into the conversation were intrigued by the use of a Hindi word by a Pakistani controller.
Actually, Pakistan's web of deceit had begun imploding with the arrest of Headley, the LeT scout, by the US Federal Bureau of Investigation in June 2010. He told his Indian interrogators that the Pakistan Army and ISI were deeply involved in the 26/11 attack. He was in touch with two serving ISI officers, Major Iqbal and Major Samir Ali. Headley also made the chilling revelation that every senior LeT leader was "handled" by an ISI operative.
Ansari's interrogation brings fresh embarrassment for Pakistan. He has revealed the presence of Pakistan's ISI in the control room that the let set up to monitor and direct the attack. Ansari also clarified that the LeT has been unaffected by the arrest and ongoing trial of masterminds Zakiur Rehman Lakhvi and Zarar Shah at an anti-terrorist court in Rawalpindi's Adiala Jail. The organisation is still plotting fresh attacks against India. The LeT is widely believed to be a proxy arm of the Pakistan Army. Its battle against India spilled out from Jammu and Kashmir to the Indian mainland. It was designated a "Foreign Terrorist Organisation" by the US in 2001 but the Americans saw it as an international threat only after the 26/11 attack. In April this year, US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton announced a $10 million (Rs.50 crore) bounty for information leading to the arrest and capture of LeT supremo Hafiz Saeed.
What rankles Pakistan is that Ansari was arrested and deported by its closest ally, Saudi Arabia. The kingdom wields almost undiminished power over Pakistan's army and political establishment. Through the deportation of Ansari, it has indicated that it will no longer provide protection for Pakistan's terrorists. Another suspected terrorist, Fasih Mehmood of the Indian Mujahideen, has been detained by Saudi Arabia for his role in the twin blasts outside Bangalore's Chinnaswamy stadium on April 17, 2010. He faces imminent deportation to India.
Now that the conspiracy has been exposed, some of its original theorists have backtracked. Digvijaya Singh says he had already clarified about his post-26/11 comments. "There is nothing more to say. I am happy that Home Minister P. Chidambaram has upped the ante on the terror issue and has pressed Pakistan to admit facts relating to Jundal having trained terrorists who attacked Mumbai," he told India Today. Antulay called his November 27 statement "a genuine mistake". "Multiple theories were floating in the aftermath of the attack, especially the one revolving around the death of Karkare," he said.
Antulay admitted, however, that the Hindu terror angle had momentarily deflected the nation's attention from the LeT. Mushrif now refuses to comment because the 26/11 case is subjudice but says he never questioned Pakistan's role in the attack. "If someone wants to comment on this issue he should approach the court and seek a reinvestigation," he said. Burney's newspaper ran a front-page apology on January 29, 2010. Burney himself is, however, unapologetic and says many questions on 26/11 remain unanswered. Film producer-director Mahesh Bhatt says there is no denying Pakistan's involvement but refuses to believe the theories being floated by Indian investigators now and calls for a debate. "After the 9/11 attack, people in the US raised questions on the identity of the attackers. Nobody was apologetic about their views," he says.
Kavita Karkare, the widow of Hemant, believes recent developments have vindicated her stand that the attack was not an inside job. "I have been saying since the beginning that no Hindus are involved in it. Many people floated stories for political reasons. They fell flat," she says.

Pakistan's Interior Minister Rehman Malik.

Pakistan, though, remains unapologetic even as it tries to distance itself from its Indian collaborator. On June 27, just a week after Ansari's arrival in India, Pakistan's Interior Minister Rehman Malik hurriedly called for a press conference. "Now things are getting clarified," Malik said. "Who knows if there was a sting operation by somebody from India?" Malik, while defending his army and the ISI, was silent on how Ansari, an Indian citizen, managed to get a Pakistani passport and a National Identity Card for Overseas Pakistanis. In the run-up to the July 4-5 foreign secretary-level talks between India and Pakistan in New Delhi, an anonymous source in the Pakistan foreign office told the media that 40 Indians were involved in the Mumbai attack.
Clearly, one Ansari has not dampened the spirit of the world's most dangerous benefactor of jihad. Wait for the next round of conspiracy theories, written and sold by Islamabad.
- With Shantanu Guha Ray, Kiran Tare, Bhavna Vij-Aurora and Mohammad Waqas

Read more at: http://indiatoday.intoday.in/story/abu-jundal-arrest-kasab-mumbai-terror-attacks-conspiracy-theories/1/204085.html

Gunrunners of North-East

Chinese agents smuggle arms to revive militancy in north-eastern India

S andeep Unnithan and Kaushik Deka in Guwahati  May 28, 2011 | UPDATED 20:49 IST

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China is reviving a flagging militancy in north-eastern India with arms and military training. In return, it wants militants to spy on nuclear missiles and military formations deployed in the North-east. And, by charging market prices for the weapons, it is looking to make a fast buck too. "The logic seems to be: keep the North-east on the boil and simultaneously profit from arms sales," says a senior military intelligence official. This marks a departure from the 1970s when China supplied weapons and training free.

With the arrest of three key insurgent operatives, intelligence agencies are piecing together China's subversive agenda for the North-east. A recent charge-sheet filed by the National Investigation Agency (NIA) against Anthony Shimray, chief arms procurer of the Isak-Muivah faction of Nationalist Socialist Council of Nagaland (NSCN-IM), specifically mentions Norinco, one of China's largest state-owned weapons manufacturers. Bangkok-based nscn-im rebels had allegedly paid $100,000 to Norinco to buy 10,000 assault rifles, pistols, rocket-propelled grenades and ammunition. A United National Liberation Front of Manipur (UNLF) delegation that went to Ruili in China's Yunnan province in 2009 was given rate cards for weaponry but could not afford the high prices: $1 million for a rocket-propelled grenade 'package' comprising 20 launchers and 2,000 rockets. For training, it was $512,000.

Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) officials call Norinco or the China North Industries Corporation a front for China's military intelligence, supplying weapons to buyers ranging from African dictators to Asian rebel groups. Norinco's name first surfaced during the 2004 haul at Chittagong where Bangladeshi security agencies intercepted a consignment of 4,930 firearms, including rockets, grenades and assault rifles, meant for the United Liberation Front of Asom (ULFA) and nscn-im. India has not taken up with China the issue of a legitimate entity supplying arms to non-state actors. A Chinese-made AK-56 is easily available in Dimapur for Rs 2 lakh, a sophisticated Austrian Glock pistol for Rs 3 lakh. "Chinese guns are sold illegally like sweets. With such easy availability of arms, anyone can start an 'insurgency'," says Binalakshmi Nepram of the Control Arms Foundation of India. The fresh revelations come at a time when India has resumed military exchanges with China following the recent visit of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh. A recurring theme of two joint Sino-Indian military exercises have been 'anti-terrorist drills'.

Militancy is on the wane in the North-east. The total fatalities in the region were down to 322 deaths in 2010 from 853 in 2009. But with China reviving its support to north-eastern guerrillas and using them as spies, a new chapter has been added. "In view of the current Sino-Indian relations, China considers the North-east more important than other parts of India," a senior unlf member noted during a debrief of his visit to China.

Senior police officials say that China has displaced the traditional markets of South-east Asia as the number one hub for weapons. "Assam militants have been going to China for their arms," confirms Khagen Sharma, Additional Director General of Assam Police (special branch). Home Secretary G.K. Pillai hints that the Chinese state may be unaware of the middlemen who operate in South-east Asia. "There is a lot of smuggling by Chinese arms agents who come to India through Myanmar and Bangkok. Most insurgent groups get weapons of Chinese origin through these agents," he says.

Cadres of Kuki national front with their arms in Imphal, Manipur

Sanctuaries are being offered by the Chinese security establishment. ulfa chief Paresh Barua operates out of Yunnan reportedly with the blessings of the Chinese military. The Chinese intelligence services have links with other rebel groups as well. The first indications emerged in August 2009 when Manipur police captured Ronny, a 'sergeant' in the banned insurgent group, the People's Liberation Army (PLA). He confirmed to his police interrogators that "Sixteen pla platoons (around 300 men) returned after training in China." The breakthrough, however, came in August last year with the arrest of Rajkumar Meghen, the head of the UNLF. Meghen, the charismatic scion of the Manipur royal family, was captured in a joint Indo-Bangladeshi operation in Dhaka and transported by road to Bihar where he was formally arrested by the nia. His arrest was preceded by the capture of 18 unlf operatives in Guwahati. Recovered from the militants was a laptop with detailed accounts of their operations and links with China. The establishment of an arms line from China in the 1990s meant that the north-eastern guerillas could buy their weapons instead of snatching them from security forces. "The establishment of a full-fledged arms supply line means it is only a matter of time before these arms flow into the Indian mainland," says an nia official. The unlf was in contact with Maoists operating in central India. A unlf note prepared for the Chinese says that the Maoist movement has spread to over 25 per cent of the Indian land mass. "If we have sufficient supplies of arms and ammunition, the Maoist struggle will achieve a qualitative development," it says.

Since the 1962 border war with India, China has held out twin threats to India's North-east. The first, a conventional military thrust down from Tibet into the 20-km-wide "Siliguri corridor" that could sever the entire region from India. The second, covert assistance to insurgent groups to tie down Indian troops in prolonged counter-insurgency operations. As part of the second strategy, China has provided sanctuaries, arms and training to Naga, Manipuri and Mizo insurgent groups. In the 1960s Naga leader Angami Phizo and others embarked on a "Long March" to China-a move that cemented their ties with the People's Republic. In 2009, a delegation of unlf leaders embarked on a second "Long March" to China where the agents demanded intelligence on Indian missile movements (see Long March to China).

The arrest of Shimray in October 2010 gave the clearest lead to China's role in the north-east. Shimray was arrested in Patna, though it is believed he was picked up in Nepal and brought by road to Bihar. (His lawyer Worso Zimik says Shimray was part of the NSCN-IM delegation that was conducting talks with the Indian government and terms his arrest illegal.)

Ulfa commander-in-chief Paresh Barua with his cadres.

Currently an undertrail in Tihar jail, Shimray was negotiating a massive arms consignment of nearly 10,000 weapons from China, enough to equip a division of troops. Not all of it was for the nscn-im whose fighting strength is estimated at 4,500 guerrillas. nia officials believe a large percentage of the arms were meant to be sold to other North-eastern groups. Shimray told intelligence operatives that the Chinese suggested that the north-eastern guerillas came together under one organisation to facilitate better interaction. The nscn-im, which is currently in a cease-fire with the government since 1997, was planning to go a step further. A letter dated August 2010 from Isak Chishi Swu, one of its top two leaders, states that the nscn-im planned to appoint a representative in Ruili. The issue of Chinese arms flowing into India has been repeatedly raised in military-to-military talks. "The Chinese are always sheepish when we confront them about arms in the North-east. They tell us that they have trouble accounting for their arms stored in warehouses in Yunnan province," says a military intelligence official. The Chinese version isn't convincing. "It is hard to believe that a communist dictatorship like China would have problems accounting for its weapons," says Major General (retired) G.D. Bakshi. Unaccounted-for weapons may be just the beginning of India's north-eastern nightmare.

Attack on Pak navy base mirrors LTTE Anuradhapura attack

Opinion

Sandeep Unnithan

Attack on the Pakistan naval base mirrors LTTE strikes

Sandeep Unnithan  May 23, 2011 | UPDATED 21:08 IST

 

The May 22 attack on the naval base PNS Mehran by suicide commandos of the Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) which destroyed two Pakistani navy P3-C Orion maritime patrol aircraft and damaged an unspecified number, mirrors at least two previous attacks by the erstwhile LTTE.
The July 24, 2001 attack against Colombo's Kattunayaka military airbase carried out by 14 Black Tiger suicide commandos was the most lethal guerilla attack against a country's military aviation assets. It completely destroyed ten aircraft including two Airbuses, attack helicopters and fighter aircraft and damaged 15 other aircraft. The second attack by 21 Black Tigers against the fortified Anuradhapura military base in October 2007 destroyed 10 aircraft including helicopters and surveillance aircraft and damaged ten others.
The attacks seem to have a common modus operandi. Over a dozen suicide terrorists are usually involved in these pre-dawn attacks as they overrun the base from multiple directions. The terrorists are armed with heavy weapons including rocket propelled grenades and improvised explosive devices to be used against the aircraft. (The ten 26/11 Mumbai attackers carried AK-47s and grenades because their primary intent was to cause mass civilian casualties and hold out against the security forces).
The number of casualties in such attacks against aviation assets is comparatively low because the primary targets are aircraft. The LTTE's 2001 attack was aimed at simultaneously hitting the Sri Lankan economy and its military capability to launch air attacks to the north of the country. The 2007 attack was purely intended to degrade Sri Lankan military capability as it advanced towards the LTTE bastions.
In the case of Karachi, the target appears to be the eight US-supplied P3C Orion long range maritime patrol and strike aircraft, refurbished at a cost of $474 million. The attack took place despite all Pakistan armed forces bases going on heightened alert following the TTP's threat of retaliation over the May 1 killing of Osama bin Laden in a US military raid on a compound in Abbottabad, Pakistan.
One of the important lessons of the Second World War was the need for dispersing military aircraft to prevent them from being taken out in a pre-emptive first strike. In the opening hours of Operation Barbarossa, the Luftwaffe destroyed over 800 Soviet aircraft parked on the ground in forward air bases. The Indian air force raised a 1500-strong 'Garud' special forces in 2004 after studying the Kattunayaka airbase attack. They realized their airbases were extremely vulnerable such pre-emptive strikes by non-state actors.

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The Big Story

November 29, 2010

The secret 'K' missile family

Sandeep Unnithan  November 20, 2010 | UPDATED 17:03 IST

 

In a dramatic breakthrough in its nuclear offensive capability, India has successfully tested a submarine-launched ballistic missile (SLBM) with an eventual range of 3,500 km. Tested secretly off Visakhapatnam in January this year, the 10-m long and 1.3-m wide missile emerged from a pontoon submerged 50 m underwater and breached the surface. Painted black and white so that it can be distinguished in water, it has passed a critical parameter.
Named after India's missile man, former President APJ Abdul Kalam, the nuclear-tipped K-4 is quite significant in a batch of new-generation counter-strike strategic missiles. The top secret indigenous "K" missiles are faster, lighter and stealthier. They also make India only the sixth country to develop undersea strategic missiles.

Inside the DRDO's Gen-Next stealthy strategic missiles Shaurya/K-15 /B-05 Range 750 km Weight of missile 10 tonnes Warhead 1 tonne length 10 m Status K-15/B-05 in series production. Land-based missile awaiting clearance.

K-4 Ballistic Missile Range 3,500 km Weight of missile 20 tonnes Warhead 1 tonne length 10 m Status Second test by January 2011. At least six more tests before induction by 2017. Future variants for larger nuclear submarines to be 2 m taller and have 5,000-km range.

Air-Launched Missile Range 200 km Weight of missile 2 tonne Warhead 500 kg length 4 m Status Hypersonic missile project called the Air Launched Article. Designed to fit under the belly of a Su-30MKI. First prototype by 2012.

A second firing, to be conducted off Visakhapatnam within two months, will revalidate a critical parameter-the ability of a 20-tonne projectile to withstand 50 kg of water pressure and eject from a submerged launcher before engaging its rocket booster. What makes an SLBM relevant in the Indian context is that it is part of the third leg of the nuclear deterrent (air and ground-launched weapons being the other two) and the ideal invulnerable second strike weapon stated in the nuclear doctrine. Defence officials say a long range SLBM like the K-4 will enable an Indian nuclear submarine lurking in the Bay of Bengal to target China and Pakistan simultaneously. Launched last year, India's first indigenous nuclear-powered submarine Arihant has been designed to carry four K-4s or 12 of the 750-km range K-15s.
DRDO officials say that the K-4 will be ready for induction before the end of the decade. This is because most technologies, including the sophisticated guidance packages, were already perfected while developing the shorter range K-15 SLBM. Defence officials, however, are cautious because despite a history of missile expertise, Russia has witnessed multiple failures of its new Bulava SLBM. In the works is an as yet unnamed longer-legged variant of the K-4 with a 5,000-km range. The 12-m long missile is meant to arm future nuclear submarines.
But while the DRDO parades its Agni and Prithvi missiles on Republic Day, it will not even acknowledge the existence of any of these "black projects� that have been cloaked under the Advanced Technology Vessel Project (ATV) that builds the Arihant class of nuclear submarines.

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East

Army commandos daring hostage rescue in Assam jungles

Sandeep Unnithan  New Delhi, October 9, 2010 | UPDATED 19:42 IST

 

A muffled thump of a silenced Micro-Uzi, bursts of AK-47 fire and a frantic jungle firefight. As Delhi warmed up to the spectacular opening ceremony of the Commonwealth games in New Delhi, the army's special forces raced through the jungles of Assam to perform a daring textbook rescue killing four cadres of the banned militant group the National Democratic Front of Bodoland and freeing a businessman they were holding hostage.

Location of the encounter between the army's special forces and militants of National Democratic Front of BodolandRescue missions are delicate surgeries meant to be carried out with scalpel-like precision to ensure that no harm comes to the hostages. This is usually far from the case as these missions end up as messy Pyrrhic victories with the hostages trapped between the good and the bad.
The story of this rare jungle rescue began on September 24 when the militants kidnapped Katan Nandi (36) son of a local grocery and retail store owner Parikshit Nandi in Dimu, Dhemaji district. They threatened to kill him unless a Rs.50 lakh ransom was paid up. Both the ULFA and the NDFB have accelerated kidnappings to generate funds for the groups with ransoms ranging from Rs.50 lakh to Rs.1 crore.
The Assam police dialed an Indian army's jungle warfare trained army Para-SF unit located nearby. On September 29, the unit began its task of locating the hostage. The unit was tipped off about the presence of the militants and began the grueling five-day task of collecting local intelligence.
Based on a local farmer's inputs that he had heard voices in the forest, they moved in to a search area of one kilometer by one kilometer. The wait paid off around noon on October 3. After a six-hour surveillance using spotter scopes, a group of four commandos located two suspicious individuals near the jungles north-west of Dhimaji district of Assam close to the Arunachal Pradesh border.
Weapons that were captured after the forest encounterThe commandos began stalking their quarry. The duo walked to a forest clearing where there were ten other militants. The hostage was bound and put at the foot of a tree while some of the militants sat playing cards, cooking food and waiting for their ransom to arrive.
It was noon but the thick and impenetrable forest cover made it seem like dusk. As the commandos crawled through the dense undergrowth, they were hit by stones and abuses in Assamese. The militants mistook them for foraging animals.
A few metres away, one of the crawling commandos ran into a startled sentry. Before he could reach for his weapon, the commando had whipped out his silenced Micro-Uzi and shot him in the head. The thump of the Uzi traveled across the jungle.
The firefight had begun. The militants began sheltering behind trees and blasting away with their AK-47s. The commandos were outnumbered. They could not use their force-multipliers, an 84mm Carl Gustav rocket launcher and 'Pika' machine gun, for fear of killing the hostage who was left under the tree. One of the commandos shouted out in Assamese asking the hostage not to run, he then darted forward and grabbed him by his legs and dragged him to safety.
The militants began pouring fire in his direction. One of the commandos carefully aimed and brought down two militants. A second commando shot one more militant and the rest fled into the undergrowth.
The end of a successful hostage rescue mission. The commandos then trekked for 24 hours through the jungle to reach the nearest road where a warm reception awaited them.

Read more at: http://indiatoday.intoday.in/story/army-commandos-daring-hostage-rescue-in-assam-jungles/1/115768.html

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DEFENCE

January 26, 2004

The Ghazi mystery

New pictures of 1971 war Pak submarine Ghazi renew debate on cause behind blast on vessel

Sandeep Unnithan  January 26, 2004 | UPDATED 14:26 IST

 

December 4, 1971: The first rays of dawn had just illuminated Vizag harbour when Lieutenant Sridhar More steered the INS Akshay out towards the open sea.

War had broken out between India and Pakistan the previous day, but all was quiet on the eastern coast. At least until a few hours earlier when some fishermen had visited the Eastern Naval Command with pieces of wreckage and reported an oil slick.

STEEL SHARK: PNS Ghazi enters Karachi harbour in 1964

As the Akshay made its way to the spot, More saw an oil slick stretching out as far as the eye could see.
The first of the divers who went down to investigate surfaced after a few minutes and gasped. "Sir, it's a submarine." A second diver was sent in.

He surfaced half an hour later, excited. "I've felt the length of the submarine and its fin. The mouth is blown open." More punched out a signal to the Maritime Operations Room (MOR) in Vizag: "Have located bottomed submarine in position Dolphin light 110 4.1."

Soon after the divers could make out the Urdu initials on the black shape, More flashed his second signal. "Confirmed submarine is Pakistani." Thumbing through his copy of Jane's Fighting Ships, More sized up Pakistan's fleet of four submarines.

Three were the smaller French coastal submarines of the Daphne class, less than 200 ft long, and the fourth and largest one was the Ghazi. The divers estimated its length to be over 300 ft. More's third and last signal sent a ripple through the base: "It is the Ghazi."

December 10, 2003: Exactly 32 years and a week later, Petty Officer Rajaram Dinkar Patil rappelled down a rope into the sea off Visakhapatnam. He was part of a team of 10 divers from the Eastern Naval Command, sent down for another look at an old enemy that had come so close and failed.

As Patil switched on his underwater camera, the crew onboard the Gemini crowded around the monitor to see what he was seeing. The Ghazi, in death, was teeming with life.

PICTURE OF DECAY: One of the first ever images of the Ghazi; the team at the site (left)

Its hull was covered with thousands of fishing nets. Patil relayed what would be the first publicly released footage of the last submarine to sink in a war. Footage that experts from submarine museums in the US,USS Cod in Cleveland and USS Torsk in Baltimore, helped INDIA TODAY understand.

Ghazi was still sitting on an even keel, but its thin outer hull had all but chipped away, exposing the steel skeleton which covered its internal pressure hull and its grid of pipes and fittings. The aft escape hatch was blown open and lay exposed to the sea. An 18-inch high bronze capstan, used for docking and torpedo loading, sat fastened to the deck, chalk white and coral-encrusted.
"The fishing nets made it look like a trapped marine beast," says Commander Ajay Chauhan, command diving and special operations officer. The Ghazi had indeed fallen into and died in a net, a wartime ruse that killed it.
November 14, 1971: Millions of refugees were fleeing into India from the Pakistan Army's rampage in the east. A full-scale war seemed only a matter of time.

PNS Ghazi quietly cast its moorings and sailed out of Karachi harbour into the Arabian Sea with its crew of 93 men and crammed with food and ammunition. It had sailed out ostensibly for Chittagong in East Pakistan, but its real mission was known to only a few in the submarine directorate and probably just its captain, Zafar Muhammad Khan.

The Ghazi, formerly USS Diablo, was built during World War II. It was leased to Pakistan in 1964 and rechristened Ghazi or "holy warrior" and was South Asia's first submarine. The 26-year-old steel shark's sinews may have been ageing but it still had phenomenal Pacific reach - it could stay out at sea for 75 days at a stretch and travel over 11,000 nautical miles (17,000 km).

FITTING IN THE PIECES

November 14, 1971:Pakistani submarine Ghazi leaves Karachi for Chittagong in East Pakistan. Its real mission is to target Indian aircraft carrier Vikrant. Fooled by an Indian ruse that Vikrant is in Vizag, Ghazi reaches the port town. December 3, 1971: War breaks out between India and Pakistan. But a mysterious blast sinks Ghazi off Vizag harbour. Three days later, Vikrant launches airstrike against East Pakistan. December 10, 2003: Indian Navy divers go down to examine the Ghazi in a bid to solve the decades-old puzzle. Underwater cameras take images of the vessel but the answer is still unclear.

The pride of the Pakistan Navy now sailed to India's eastern coast to seek the aircraft carrier Vikrant in a gladiatorial contest. By November 23, the Ghazi had travelled over 2,200 nautical miles from Karachi to reach a patrol area codenamed Zone Mike - Madras.

Vice-admiral Krishnan, the Flag Officer Commanding, Eastern Naval Command, was a maverick whose colourful language could make a seasoned sailor blush. In November 1971, he looked out to sea and was a worried man.

The Eastern Fleet's aircraft carrier Vikrant was tasked with blockading East Pakistan from the sea but the vessel had a crack in its boiler which reduced its speed to just 16 knots and made it vulnerable to submarines. That was not all.

Signal intercepts of the Pakistan Navy indicated an imminent deployment of the Ghazi in the Bay. But the maverick admiral was also a master of ruses. In 1946, as the captain of the Royal Indian Navy frigateRINS Shamsher, Krishnan had fabricated an alarm for a downed aircraft off Mumbai, sailed out to hunt for this "aircraft" and ensured his men didn't join the naval mutiny raging in the city.

Now, 25 years later, he had to pull off his best one yet. Krishnan did everything to let the enemy believe that the Vikrant was still in Vizag. He summoned Lt-Commander Inder Singh, the captain of INS Rajput, an ageing destroyer which was being sent to Vizag to be decommissioned.

The wily Krishnan gave it and Inder Singh one last mission - the Rajput was to pretend to be the Vikrant, sail 160 miles out of Vizag harbour and generate heavy wireless traffic - which would lead the enemy to believe there was a large ship in the vicinity. He then falsely informed naval authorities in Madras that the carrier would be arriving there shortly.

In Vizag, he began ordering huge quantities of rations - meat and vegetables - which indicated that the fleet was in harbour. He hoped that spies in the city would pick up and transmit this intelligence. The bait was snapped up.

On November 26, 1971, the Ghazi's wireless room crackled with a terse message from the commodore, submarines: "Occupy Zone Victor with all despatch. Intelligence indicates carrier in port." Khan altered course and sped his submarine north.

Zone Victor was Vizag. Reaching Vizag on November 27, the mechanical predator prowled perilously close to the Indian coast, looking for its quarry.
December 3, 1971: Shortly after midnight on December 3, an explosion tore through the forward section of the Ghazi where torpedoes and mines were stored. The shockwave blew open the knife-shaped bow, crumpling the hull and cracking open watertight compartments. Seawater rushed in, snuffing out all the lights and drowning the crew.

Ghazi's doomed mission

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The submarine careened out of control and crashed to the seabed. "At a depth of 30 m, a hole as small as 0.5 mm would let in 30 tonnes of water per hour, impossible to pump out," explains marine medicine specialist Surgeon Commander Sangram Singh Pundir.
"The lucky crewmen would have died in the first few seconds, the unlucky ones in the aft section hours later when the air supply ran out."

A few days later, divers blasted their way into the stricken submarine and brought to the surface six bloated bodies of Pakistani crewmen. One of the dead sailors, a Petty Officer Mechanical Engineer, had a wheel spanner tightly grasped in his fist. Another sailor had in his pocket a poignant letter written in Urdu to his fiancee.

"I don't know if you will ever read this, but we are here separated by thousands of miles of sea..." Where was the Vikrant? Days before the Ghazi arrived off Madras, the carrier and her escorts had already sailed into "X Ray" a secret palmfronded anchorage in the Andaman Islands nearly 1,000 miles away.

Here, far from prying eyes, the fleet awaited the signal to strike at East Pakistan and enforce a complete sea blockade. On December 6 morning, three days after the sinking of the Ghazi, the Vikrant launched its first airstrike. How exactly did the Ghazi die?

Official accounts of the Pakistan Navy say that it triggered off one of its own mines, but divers who studied the wreckage say the submarine must have suffered an internal explosion which blew up its mines and torpedoes. Another theory suggests an explosion of gases built up inside the submarine while its batteries were being charged.

WATERY GRAVE: Another image of the Ghazi shows its conning tower

This too has been disputed since the bodies recovered were not charred. In the past three decades, the Indian Navy has made a series of attempts to unravel the puzzle but failed. The latest expedition was another bid to solve the enigma.

"We would like to know what exactly happened to the Ghazi," says Vice-admiral (retd) Vinod Pasricha who converted the submarine Kursura and the Vikrant into maritime museums. "It would be of great historical value in the long term and would solve one of the last great mysteries of the 1971 war."

Vice-admiral (retd) G.M. Hiranandani, whose book Transition to Triumph gives an exhaustive account of the sinking of the Ghazi, says the submarine almost certainly suffered an internal explosion but its causes are debatable.

"The Pakistani account exonerates the poor condition of the submarine by saying it set off one of its mines, while the chauvinistic Indian version says the Rajputdropped depth charges sinking it." The truth about the Ghazi, which remains what the submarine community calls "on eternal patrol", lies somewhere in between.

Read more at: http://indiatoday.intoday.in/story/new-pictures-of-1971-war-pak-submarine-ghazi-renew-debate-on-cause-behind-blast-on-vessel/1/196709.html