Newspaper Article 14/06/2014
There is a common perception that India and Bangladesh have good cordial relation.
Especially Awami League and its head “Sheikh Haseena Wajid” always present a rosy picture in this regard. But impartial observers do not agree with this idea. They think that it is purely a myth and not reality.to prove their logic these observers present the Indian newly appointed security adviser “Ajit Doval” who thinks that Bangladesh is the biggest thread to Indian security.
On 26 April 2006 Ajit Doval talked to Indian news “rediff.com”. He said categorically that “I consider infiltration of Bangladeshis the biggest internal security problem. It’s the biggest because the government feels that it can do nothing about it. There is no military response, diplomatic responses have failed, border management is not effective and the legal response is not doable because two crore illegal people’s adjudication will take 200 years. Even then, you can take those adjudicated outsiders to the border, Bangladesh may not accept them. And even when they are accepted they come back after 15 days to a new destination in India”.
On This occasion Doval further said ” India’s problem is how to fight subversion or sabotage if you have a support base of two crore people who are from outside. It is difficult to infiltrate five terrorists or 50 saboteurs or 200 persons who indulge in communal violence. Pakistan will be never able to send in 200 people at a time at the border. From Bangladesh 2,000 persons can get in if you pay Rs 3,000 per head. It is just not possible to stop them”.
In this regard he also said “For India, the eye-opener was in 2001 during the Tabligh e Jamat congregation in Dhaka. It was the biggest congregation after the Haj in Mecca. More than 40 lakh Muslims gathered there. An amazing number of people went from India. We had never heard so many anti-India speeches before at any such congregation. These speeches were made at the event attended by the prime minister, chief justice and many other top leaders of Bangladesh. The entire environment being created there is that India is the enemy country”.
When Sheila Bhatt (the correspondent of rediff.com) asked “IN THIS SCENARIO WHAT ARE INDIA”S OPTIONS?
He replied “Somebody has to be given the task. Find the man and assign the task to him. Ask his team to deliver. Monitor how many Bangladeshis return. Even if 20 to 30 percent return it will make an impact. You must remember that all over India more than 200 constituencies are such that politicians will be tempted to take decisions favoring immigrants and compromise national security. Bangladesh infiltration will lead to politics of communalism”.
Now there is very unique situation has developed. It will be very interesting to see that how that gentleman face this situation because now he is at the helm of the affairs. In fact he is chief of India’s National security setup. Perhaps it will be also very difficult scenario that how Awami League satisfies his own country fellows against this Indian blame game.
Published in Pakistan observer on 12 June 2014
Disclaimer: Views expressed are of the writer; and are not necessarily reflective of IPRI policy