Jammu attack: What was the real target?
Sandhya Jain
September 27, 2013
The high security Kathua District Jail and Sub Jail Hira Nagar, where several high profile Pakistani and foreign prisoners are lodged, was the intended target of the terrorist attack and the incident at Samba could have been a coordinated distraction to engage the Army while the fidayeen extracted their comrades, according to sources from Jammu.
Security arrangements at the prison were reviewed by Director General Prisons K Rajendra Kumar as recently as May 2013; the Hira Nagar police station is part of the same compound, with a different entrance. A total of 12 persons have reportedly been killed in the twin attacks, as also two of the fidayeen, and at least two civilians, though the complete details are still unclear.
Kathua district is close to the India-Pakistan border. In a glaring security lapse, terrorists dressed in Indian Army fatigues entered the city and commandeered a tempo ferrying vegetables to take them to Hira Nagar prison. Their intention was to release some of their comrades. Not being very conversant with the place, the driver took them to the Kathua-Hira Nagar Jail complex, but stopped his vehicle outside the gate of the police station. It was 6.45 am and the policemen on duty were not fully alert. Seeing the policemen inside, the terrorists mistook the entrance for the jail precincts, walked in and began firing indiscriminately, killing as many as four policemen in 40 minutes of firing. They also lobbed hand grenades. Four policemen died in the attack, according to the reports.
At some stage, the terrorists realised the error, and failing to rescue the Pakistani prisoners, drove away in a truck parked in front of the police station, which was found abandoned on the national highway. Other sources said the terrorists went back to the National Highway (it is not clear how, because the vehicle that brought them to the prison would have long fled the scene, unless they killed the driver and took his vehicle) and boarded a truck at gun point, killing the cleaner.
On reaching 16 Cavalry on the Samba highway, they shot the driver dead and entered the camp. Previously, in 2002, terrorists had attacked Kaluchak Army camp in Samba district and killed 31 people, including three Army jawans, 18 family members of Army men and 10 civilians.
The attack on the Samba Army camp resulted in the death of a serving Lt Colonel and two soldiers. Some civilians are said to have died in the crossfire. General Officer Commanding-in-Chief Northern Command Lt Gen Sanjiv Chachra and GOC of the Nagrota-based 16 Corps and IGP Jammu Rajesh Kumar and DIG Jammu-Kathua range Shakeel Beg have rushed to Samba.
Professor Bhim Singh, president of the Panthers Party, feels these were separate attacks to distract attention from the attack on the jail. It seems unlikely that the same group wearing Army uniforms could have moved from Kathua after the alert was sounded about the attack, and reached Samba without being detected or checked en route. It is a massive failure of the Central, Army, and State intelligence agencies that such an easy penetration of the border could take place.
The attack is an indictment of the National Conference–Congress coalition. On September 25, the Chief Minister cast aspersions on the accession to India by last Maharaja Hari Singh and repeated his asinine claim that the J&K had not ‘merged’ with India. It is time to call this anti-national bluff; if there is no merger, Omar Abdullah should not be Chief Minister of a State which is an integral part of India under Article 1 of the Constitution; nor should his father, Farooq Abdullah, be a member of the Union Cabinet. A beginning must be made by making this family surrender its Indian passports.
There is an urgent case for Governor’s rule to restore some semblance of security to this sensitive border State, given the instability promoted by Omar Abdullah’s frequent immature statements, and the growing terrorist incidents on account of his failure to govern properly.
In January this year, a jawan was beheaded on the LoC and another murdered; in March, there was a fidayeen attack on a paramilitary camp at Bemina in Srinagar in which five CRPF men were killed, along with three terrorists; in June, eight army men were killed in a fidayeen attack at Hyderpora.
India must also revisit the disruptive Article 370 and move towards its outright abolition. This is a cat that needs to be belled with utmost urgency.Omar Abdullah’s greatest anxiety in the wake of the attacks was that somehow the talks between the Indian and Pakistani Prime Ministers should not be scuttled. He refused to hold the Pakistan Government responsible for the assault, and it may well be that Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif was in the dark about it, but Islamabad’s accountability is in no way diminished by this.
Sadly, Dr Manmohan Singh is committed to this unproductive diplomacy with the same tenacity with which he was committed to the India-US Nuclear Deal, the logic and benefit of which still eludes the nation.
The Kathua – Samba twin incidents vindicate former Army chief Gen VK Singh’s contention that the growing incidents along the Pakistan and China borders are a fallout of the disbandment of the Technical Support Division (TSD), a counter intelligence unit of the Indian Army which became fully operational during his tenure.
The recent calumny unleashed against the veteran soldier is a scandal in itself. But far more scandalous is the silence of Gen Bikram Singh, who is fully aware that the TSD functioned under the Military Intelligence Directorate and was not a private intelligence unit created by Gen VK Singh to spy on the Ministry or fellow officers. To redeem in own honour in the public, Gen Bikram Singh needs to make this aspect of the TSD known to the nation, and ensure that the witch hunt against his predecessor is stopped without further ado.
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