For terrorists targeting India, there seems to be a very loyal ally in this mission: The very security agencies that are supposed to fight them.
The main intention of modern day terrorism is to create largescale panic. For terrorists targeting India, there seems to be a very loyal ally in this mission: The very security agencies that are supposed to fight them.
Security agencies across India are contributing their might to creating an unwanted public scare and giving out misleading information about suspected terrorists. Along with regular hoax threats, these scares created by security agencies are turning out be a huge headache for the security establishment and the public.
The latest was a Delhi police claim that they had arrested a suspected Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) terrorist a few days back. They said he was planning a strike in Maharashtra during the Ganesh festival. The story was concocted.
The suspect, Mohammed Aslam, is an old Students Islamic Movement of India (SIMI) member and had been involved with the LeT. But sources in the central security establishment said the Delhi police’s claim was a hoax that caused consternation in Maharashtra.
Security agencies routinely make up stories and create a public scare, sources said. In August, a couple of such hoax claims led to panic.
The Border Security Force (BSF) was caught making up stories on a few occasions this month. The first one, a couple of days after Independence Day, led to an alert in the establishment. The BSF claimed to have caught nine Pakistanis, including three terrorists, who were using the sea route, like the terrorists who attacked Mumbai last November, to enter India.
The claim set off alarm bells in the security establishment and Gujarat police. It later emerged that they were fishermen, and three of them did not have valid permits.
A few weeks back, a BSF unit in Punjab claimed it had caught a suspected terrorist, again setting off an alarm. It turned out that he was a drunkard who had run away fearing his policeman cousin from Pakistan’s Punjab.
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