SOUTH ASIA INTELLIGENCE REVIEW
Weekly Assessments & Briefings
Volume 12, No. 1, July 8, 2013

INDIA

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Bodh Gaya: Culpable Neglect
Ajai Sahni
Editor, SAIR; Executive Director, ICM & SATP

At least two monks, a Burmese and a Tibetan, were injured in a coordinated terror attack, in and around the Mahabodhi Temple (the Temple of the Great Awakening, where Buddha is believed to have attained enlightenment) Complex at Bodh Gaya in the Gaya District of Bihar on July 7, 2013. The Bihar Police has confirmed that ten low-intensity serial blasts occurred between 5:30 and 5:58 am at and around the World Heritage site. Union Home Minister Sushil Kumar Shinde confirmed, "Today I have the information of 10 blasts. A total of 13 bombs were placed there… Two persons have been injured – 50 year old Dorji and Bala Sanga (30)." Two live bombs were detected and defused at the Complex, while a third bomb was recovered near the Royal Residence hotel at Baiju Bigaha village, about four kilometres from the Mahabodhi Temple.

Examination of three unexploded bombs revealed that small LPG cylinders had been used as containers to pack explosives suspected to be a mix of ammonium nitrate, potassium and sulphur, and, according to the National Security Guard’s explosive experts, “it would be wrong to call the bombs crude”. Sources suggest that this is the first time gas cylinders have been used as containers for explosives. Investigators believe that the damage could have been far greater, but for the humid conditions currently prevailing in Gaya, which may have affected the explosive materials. Some instructions in Urdu were reportedly found along with the bombs recovered and defused in Bodh Gaya, including instruction to target Bara But (big statue) and 'bus', while another message declared that the operation was intended to avenge what had happened in Iraq.

The incident has provoked the usual speculative storm in the media, this time about the opening of a ‘new front’. Bihar has not witnessed any major Islamist terrorist attack in the past, and Buddhist sites across India have also remained exempt from such strikes. Again, the usual clamour about security and intelligence failures has also been raised. Fairly specific intelligence regarding an imminent threat to the Bodh Gaya site in particular, and Buddhist targets in general, particularly in the wake of the organized attacks against Rohingya Muslims in Myanmar, had been communicated to the Bihar Government. Despite these, rudimentary processes of access control and surveillance appear to have been ignored, even as the terrorists succeeded in planting at least four explosive devices within the core area of the shrine.

Rarely has precedent intelligence been as specific as it was in the case of the threat to Bodh Gaya. Most significantly, Indian Mujahiddeen (IM) operatives Syed Maqbool, Asad Khan, Langde Irfan Mustafa, Imran Khan and Syed Feroz aka Hamza — all arrested by the Delhi Police Special Cell in September-October 2012 — had revealed during interrogations in October 2012 that Dilsukhnagar in Hyderabad and Buddhist Temples in Bodh Gaya had been reconnoitered by them on instructions from Pakistan-based IM founder Riyaz Bhatkal. Crucially, twin blasts had been engineered in Hyderabad's Dilsukhnagar on February 21, 2013, resulting in 17 killed and 117 injured, confirming the reliability of the disclosures. Other targets where the four had carried out reconnaissance included Delhi’s Chandni Chowk and Sadar Bazar; Mumbai’ McDonald restaurant at Andheri Station, shops near the Santa Cruz Station, the Dadar Bus Stop, Chhatrapati Shivaji Terminus and Panvel Station, as well as some areas in Bandra and Jogeshwari. All these are crowded public places which could be expected to yield significant mass casualties in the event of an attack. 

All the reconnaissance operations were approved by the Bhatkal brothers, and sources indicate that a meeting for the Bodh Gaya survey was held in Hyderabad in 2012 at the house of Obaid-ur-Rehman, a key accused in the Dilsukhnagar twin blasts. Delhi’s Special Cell had sent an intelligence advisory in October 2012 to Bihar's Director General of Police and the Gaya Superintendent of Police, warning about a possible strike.

Significantly, again, during the a National Investigation Agency (NIA) team’s interrogation of the 26/11 Mumbai attack accused David Headley in the US in June 2010, Headley had claimed that the Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) had prepared a video on the Mahabodhi Temple and was planning to trigger blasts there.

The Intelligence Bureau (IB) had also warned Bihar twice over the past three months that Bodh Gaya was on the hit list of terrorist groups, with sketches of two suspects sent just a fortnight before the attack. These reports had even been published in the media, specifically mentioning the targeting of Buddhist Temples in reaction to alleged atrocities on Rohingya Muslims in Myanmar.

Indeed, the threat to Bodh Gaya in particular, and to wider Buddhist targets in general, has been some time in existence. Lashkar-e-Taiba chief Hafiz Mohammad Saeed had tweeted, on June 14, 2013, "Indian government is working in cahoots with Burmese Government to wipe out Muslim population of Burma"; and again, "It is also an obligation on the whole Muslim Ummah to defend the rights and honour of Rohingya Muslims in Burma."

Even earlier, Ustad Farooq, the head of Al-Qaeda’s ‘preaching and media department’ for Pakistan, had warned, in September 2012, that the killings of Muslims in Myanmar and Assam “provide impetus for us to hasten our advance towards Delhi… I warn the Indian Government that after Kashmir, Gujarat… you may add Assam to the long list of your evil deeds.”

The Union Ministry of Home Affairs (UMHA) has now issued an advisory to all States, asking them to beef up security at Buddhist shrines and Tibetan settlements, as these could be targeted by radical outfits "in the light of clashes between Rohingya Muslims and Buddhists in Myanmar in the recent months".

Radicalized Rohingyas have also established linkages with Islamist organizations and with the Inter Services Intelligence (ISI) in Pakistan. Intelligence sources indicate that, in recent months, both LeT and other groups have taken Rohingyas to Pakistan for training. Significantly, US, Bangladeshi and Singapore intelligence agencies have documented information on Rohingya Muslim radicals training at a LeT camp in Pakistan in May 2012. India’s Research and Analysis Wing (R&AW) had, in January 2013, indicated that LeT was trying to establish a toehold in Myanmar’s Arakan area, had created a group, the Difa-e-Musalman Arakan (Defence of Muslims in the Arakan), and was mobilising cadres to fight the Myanmar Government. The R&AW also underlined links between Rohingya radicals and groups such as Jaish-e-Mohammed (JeM) of Pakistan, and Harkat-ul-Jihad al-Islami and Jamaat-ul-Mujahideen of Bangladesh. A new group called the Jamaat-ul-Arakan had also been formed, and was said to be running training camps in the remote Bandarban District of Bangladesh, adjoining Myanmar. The R&AW claimed that Rohingya radicals were receiving funds principally from Saudi Arabia, training from Pakistan-based operatives, and weapons sourced from Thailand. Crucially, the Institute for Conflict Management (ICM) has tracked linkages between Rohingya Radicals and Pakistan-backed Islamist terrorist formations in Bangladesh since 1999.

Again, while no major Islamist terrorist incident has been recorded in Bihar prior to the Bodh Gaya serial bombings, Islamist terrorist linkages with the State have a considerable history. On February11, 2013, for instance, the Maharashtra Anti-Terrorism Squad (ATS) chief Rakesh Maria disclosed, "While probing the Mumbai (July 13, 2011) and Pune serial blasts (Jangli Maharaj Road, August 1, 2012), we came across certain information. It’s now clear that Ahmed Zarar Siddibapa, alias Yasin Bhatkal, Tabrez, alias Danial, and Ahmed, alias Waqqas, also took part in last year's Pune explosion. While Tabrez and Waqqas planted the bombs, Bhatkal was part of the conspiracy. The fourth person in the wanted list is Tahseen Shaikh, a Bihar resident."

Further, media reports indicate, Fasih Mahmood, one of the founding members of IM, also belonged to Bihar. He was an active member of the Students Islamic Movement of India (SIMI) and came in contact with the Bhatkal brothers while he was a student of an engineering college in Karnataka in 2000. By 2003, he had been recruited by Aamir Reza Khan, who was allegedly involved in the attack on the American Center at Kolkata and the kidnapping of the owner of a shoe company. The ransom money from the kidnapping was allegedly used by Mohammad Atta in the US 9/11 (2001) bombings. While the actual operations in Pune and Mumbai were carried out by operatives from Pune and Beed in Maharashtra, and from Azamgarh in Uttar Pradesh, the responsibility for nationwide attacks had been vested in the "Bihar module", drawing cadres principally from Darbhanga, Samastipur, Nalanda and Munger.

According to media reports, of 14 IM operatives arrested in the recent past by various agencies, 13 are drawn from Bihar's Darbhanga District alone. Investigations by Delhi Police, which neutralized the Darbhanga module with half-a-dozen arrests in December 2011, and by the NIA, have revealed that IM's operations chief Ahmed Zara Siddibappa aka Yasin Bhatkal had been working on the Bihar module ever since the neutralization of the outfit's Maharashtra and Azamgarh modules in 2008.

Reports also indicate that several of these suspects were alleged to be responsible for the February 2010 German Bakery blast in Pune; the Chinnaswamy Stadium blast in Bangalore (April 2010); the Jama Masjid firing in Delhi (September 2010); and the July 13, 2011 blasts in Mumbai. Before executing the 13/7 Mumbai blasts, Bhatkal and his associates, including Bihar's Asadullah Akhtar, reportedly stayed in a Darbhanga village for over a year and even tested their bombs in a mango orchard there. Both Akhtar and Bhatkal are absconding.

Bihar has emerged as a principal operational base for Islamist terrorists, as general policing is weak, law and order have suffered abiding neglect, and the preparatory activities and transit of terrorists are unlikely to invite Police attention in an environment afflicted by high levels of crime, a vibrant Maoist insurgency, and grossly limited enforcement capacities.

In the wake of the Gaya blasts, there has been much talk of ‘security breach’, and strident denials by various authorities in Bihar of any negligence. Ongoing investigations may shed some doubtful light on the specific failures that contributed to the success of the terrorist strike at the Mahabodhi Complex. However, it is the general security environment – if at all the pervasive state of insecurity can be described as such – in Bihar, and the abysmal state of the Police there that lie at the heart of failure. It is significant that Bihar has long had the lowest Police-population ratio in India, presently at 67 (as on December 31, 2012, according to National Crime Records Bureau, NCRB), as against a fairly dismal national average of 138. As regards other aspects of Police functioning, again, Bihar fares poorly on almost every index of competence and modernization – this is a poorly trained, poorly equipped, demoralized Police Force, operating in an enveloping environment of corruption. For a decade and a half, commencing 1990, regimes led, first, by Laloo Prasad Yadav and then by his wife Rabri Devi, actively undermined and destroyed every institution of enforcement and justice in the State. Since his tenure commenced in November 2005, Chief Minister Nitish Kumar has succeeded in improving some indices of law and order management, but his exclusive reliance on a dubious ‘development model’ as a solution to all manifestations of political violence has compounded the neglect of the Police and enforcement apparatus. It is useful to note that Jharkhand, which was part of Bihar till November 2000, had a Police-population ratio of just 38 in 2002, when Bihar’s ratio was 69. While Jharkhand’s Police-population ratio had risen to 178 by end 2012, Bihar’s had actually fallen to 67.

Interminable post-mortems of each terrorist excess – of motives and actors and strategies and devices, and intelligence or security ‘failures’ – will yield mountains of trivia, and a cacophony of opinions, but the most basic reality of a dysfunctional enforcement apparatus across India will ensure that such attacks will continue to occur. And next time around, the weather may not be as kind as it was at Bodh Gaya, and the explosive devices may actually secure their lethal potential.

INDIA

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Maoists: Back in Business
Mrinal Kanta Das
Research Assistant, Institute for Conflict Management

On May 25, 2013, the Communist Party of India – Maoist (CPI-Maoist) sent shock waves across the country by attacking a Congress Party convoy in the Darbha Valley of Bastar District, Chhattisgarh, killing 26 persons, including Mahendra Karma, the controversial architect of the armed Salwa Judum anti-Maoist ‘people’s movement’

Just over a month later, on July 2, 2013, the Maoists have killed Amarjit Balihar, the Pakur District Superintendent of Police (SP) and five other Policemen in an ambush in the Kathikund Forest area of Dumka District, bordering Pakur. The SP was returning from a meeting with Deputy Inspector General (DIG) Priya Dubey in Dumka District when his vehicle was attacked by Maoists. The Maoists first triggered a landmine blast and then started firing indiscriminately on the convoy from higher ground. Another three Policemen suffered serious injuries. The Maoists escaped with two AK-47s, four INSAS rifles, two pistols and more than 600 rounds of ammunition.

The attack took place at a time when some 3,000 Security Force (SF) personnel belonging to the Jharkhand Police and Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) were carrying out operations against the Maoists in the jungles of Palamu District. These operations commenced on June 25, 2013, and it is unsurprising that the Maoists have exploited underprepared SFs in another area. In recent times, whenever the SFs have focused on areas of Maoist strength, the Maoists have retaliated by extending their violence to other areas, in keeping with their tactical decision to “step up” their tactical counter-offensive (TCO) “in new areas so as to divert a section of the enemy forces from attacking our guerrilla bases and organs of political power.” Thus, when SFs focused their operations on Latehar, Gumla and Garwah Districts in north-western Jharkhand, the Maoists struck in the Saranda Forest areas in south Jharkhand, forcing the SFs to divert troops to execute operation Anaconda II. As Force deployment has remained stretched in traditional Maoist strongholds, gaping holes have emerged in the security net in the Santhal Pargana areas of Northeast Jharkhand.

Jharkhand has about 20 battalions of Central Armed Police Forces (CAPFs), 18 of the CRPF and two Sashastra Seema Bal, SSB; however, none of these were deployed in Dumka and Pakur Districts, which are thought to be marginally affected by Maoist activities. After the Dumka attack, two companies of CAPFs have been sent to the area. It may be noted that Jharkhand’s Police Population ratio (Policemen per 100,000 population) was 178 during 2012, well above the national average of 138, though substantially below the level needed to deal with the State’s complex problems of law and order administration and security. Only a small fraction of the available State Police Force is deployed for counter-insurgency operations.

Shocked reactions to the fatal attack on the Pakur SP have emphasised the very low level of past Maoist activity in the area. In the wake of the attack, Additional Director General of Police B.B. Pradhan observed, "Now Pakur and Dumka have also been officially declared as Maoist-hit Districts taking the total number of such Districts to 20 out of the total 24 in the State." This suggests that Pakur and Dumka were not previously included among Districts in the Maoist-affected category. It is significant, however, that the Security Related Expenditure (SRE) Scheme of the Union Ministry of Home Affairs (UMHA) lists 21 Districts of Jharkhand, and includes both Dumka and Pakur. Indeed, Deogarh District (a constituent District of the Santhal Pargana area that includes both Dumka and Pakur), is also on the SRE list. In fact, on June 25, 2013, the State Intelligence Department had issued an alert about the movement of Maoists in Santhal Pargana and also underlined the possibility of a major offensive against the SFs.

Clearly, then, Pakur and Dumka were not outside the realm of potential Maoist violence. Indeed, since 2010, at least two civilians and one SF trooper have been killed in Dumka; and two civilians, including a nun, have been killed in Pakur. More significantly, other patterns of Maoist violence and intimidation, including arson, extortion, etc., are far from unusual. 

K. Vijay Kumar, the former Director General, CRPF, and presently, Advisor to the UMHA on anti-Naxal operations, has chosen to describe the July 2 killings in Dumka as an "opportunistic ambush" by the Maoists, aimed at making their presence felt after suffering “steady attrition”. For one thing, it may be noted that the ‘opportunity’ was not presented to the Maoists, but was, in fact, the result of careful planning and of the efficient mounting and deployment of resources.

More significantly, Vijay Kumar’s assessment appears to militate against his own Ministry’s. On July 2, 2013, UMHA circulated a note to Members of its Consultative Committee, noting that despite a decline in violence levels, the "the core armed capabilities of the CPI (Maoist) have not suffered any significant damage". The note further emphasised that the CPI-Maoist was working "assiduously to extend its area of influence in eastern Chhattisgarh and Western Odisha... The outfit focused on organization consolidation, besides upgrading its military tactics". Similar and widely contrasting assessments have repeatedly undermined the credibility of official pronouncements on various aspects and dimensions of the Maoist challenge, and the purported ‘strategy and tactics’ of response.

Official sources have sought reassurance in the dramatic decline in total fatalities and other indices of Maoist violence over the past years, from a peak 1,180 fatalities in 2010, to a comparable low of 367 in 2012. Further, and rightly, it has been emphasised that the Maoists have lost significant leadership cadres over the past five years. What is missed out in such assessments, however, is the fact that much of the decline in violence is a consequence, first, of the abrupt termination of a bulk of offensive SF operations against the Maoists after the April 2010 massacre of 76 SF personnel at Chintalnar in Chhattisgarh, and a ceding of much of the Maoist “core areas” to the rebels; and, second, of a Maoist decision to focus on political consolidation in their areas of strength, after a demonstrable failure of their experiment to “extend the people’s war throughout the country”, which was initiated after the formations of the CPI-Maoist in 2004. It is useful to emphasise, also, that the overwhelming proportion of the loss of Maoist leadership occurred outside the Maoist “core areas”, and was the result of narrowly targeted, intelligence led operations, engineered principally by the Special Intelligence Branch of the Andhra Pradesh Police. Very few leadership losses have been inflicted by the much-vaunted, but blundering, “massive and coordinate operations” to “clear, hold and develop” areas of Maoist dominance, which were launched by the UMHA.

Whatever little reassurance could be derived from the absolute decline in levels of Maoist violence should now be abandoned. Total fatalities in 2013 already stand at 259 (till July 7), as against 367 for the whole of 2012. More significantly, the combined civilian and SF fatalities, at 166, are nearly twice the Maoist total of 93. The SF to Maoist fatality ratio is a poor 1:1.4.

Worse, closer analysis of incidents demonstrates that an increasing number of attacks are initiated by the Maoists, rather than by the SFs, clearly showing where the initiative lies. A review of major incidents indicates that Jharkhand remains the most active theater of Maoist violence with seven major incidents recorded in the State. Maoists targeted the SFs in three of these incidents, while the SFs took the fight into the Maoist camp in two incidents. Maoists targeted civilians in one major incident.  The seventh incident involved an attack by a Maoist breakaway faction, the Tritiya Prastuti Committee (TPC), on the Maoists.

24 SF personnel have been killed by the Maoists in Jharkhand in six incidents, out of which just one incident was initiated by the SFs. Moreover, out of a 20 Maoists claimed to have been killed in seven encounters during SF-initiated operations, at least 12 bodies have not been recovered. On June 13, 2013, Jharkhand Director General of Police (DGP) Rajiv Kumar claimed that encounters in the State had increased in the first five months of the year, with 31 encounters in 2013, as against 22 in 2012, and 27 in 2011, in the corresponding period, though there was a slight drop in total Left Wing Extremist (LWE)-linked incidents in this period. 

In Chhattisgarh, anti-Maoist operations have yet demonstrate any dramatic improvement in efficiency. With 26 SF personnel and 23 Maoists killed in 2013 (till July 7), the SF-Maoist fatality ratio is adverse. Out of 23 ‘Maoists’ killed, at least seven are widely believed to be villagers killed in a single botched operation. Nine were killed in another incident which was planned and executed by the Greyhounds of Andhra Pradesh. The remaining seven Maoists were killed in 11 encounters. According to partial data compiled by SATP, however, out of a total of 27 encounters, SFs clearly took the initiative in at least 17. Out of 26 SF personnel killed, nine SFs were killed in SF-initiated encounters.     

In Bihar, anti-Maoist operations have taken a back-seat, with the State Chief Minister insisting that ‘development’ and not the use force, was the ‘solution’ to the ‘Maoist problem’. The Maoists have not lost a single cadre in the State in 2013, though they have killed 10 SF personnel, seven of them in a single major attack. The Maoists also attacked the Dhanbad-Patna Intercity Express train, killing two SF personnel and one civilian.   

Maharashtra has engineered a success, by comparison, with four out of five major incidents initiated by the SFs, and inflicting heavy casualties on the Maoists, with at least 23 dead. The SFs lost just one trooper in these encounters, and total SF fatalities in the State in 2013 are a low three. The Maoists have failed to initiate even a single major attack on SFs this year. They have, however, targeted civilians in one major incident, killing three persons, including the Vice President of Lloyds, a sub contractor and a Police patil, in protest against a proposal to start mining in Surajagad and Damkodvadavi hills in Gatta, Gadchiroli District.  

In Odisha, while the Maoists have extended their network in the Nuapada, Balangir and Bargarh Districts, their activities have been eroded in other areas of the State, particularly as a result of the split in the party, with the Sabyasachi Panda group that dominated Ganjam, Kandhamal, Gajapti and Rayagada Districts, breaking away, to form the Odisha Maobadi Party (OMP). A bulk of current violence is concentrated in the Malkangiri District. Even the Koraput District, where the Maoists had a vice-like grip, has seen a waning of their influence, as more than 2,400 supporters of the Narayanpatna-based Chasi Mulia Adivasi Sangha (CMAS), a CPI-Maoist front organization, have surrendered to the Police since the beginning of the current year. 

The current escalation in Maoist violence, and the patterns of engagement with state Forces suggest progressive consolidation on the part of the former, even as the state fails to forge and sustain a coherent strategy of response. It is also apparent that the lessons of past successes against the Maoists are yet to be learned, and an overwhelming and ill-advised dependence on CAPFs and on clumsy, often counter-productive, ‘area domination’ exercises persists, to the abiding neglect of State Police and intelligence capacities and capabilities. Under the circumstances, the Maoists will continue to retain, and, indeed, build, their capacity to deliver shock after shock to the system.

INDIA

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Manipur: Nagas: United Fragments
Veronica Khangchian
Research Associate, Institute for Conflict Management

In another blow to Nationalist Socialist Council of Nagaland – Isak-Muivah’s (NSCN-IM’s) struggle for integration of Naga areas, a June 28, 2013, report indicates states that two Naga outfits operating in Manipur – the Manipur Naga Revolutionary Front (MNRF) and United Naga People’s Council (UNPC) have merged to form a new group, the Manipur Naga People’s Front (MNPF), with an armed wing, the Manipur Naga People’s Army (MNPA). This decision reportedly followed discussions on “the shaky condition of the present Naga revolutionaries.”

According to a statement issued by MNPF ‘deputy publicity secretary’, Thomas Numai, with the formation of MNPF, MNRF and UNPC have been dissolved. The statement disclosed further that a decision to dissolve the two outfits and work together under one banner was adopted at a joint meeting of the two erstwhile parties convened on March 11, 2013; John Francis Kashung was identified as the ‘chairman’ of MNPF’s first batch of central committee members. Other members included Wilson Tao (‘general secretary’), Pairson Shily (‘home secretary’), Isaac Shang (‘finance secretary’), Jack Kapso (‘organization secretary’), Thomas Numai (‘deputy finance and deputy publicity secretary’) and Ahao Jajo (‘deputy defence secretary’). The statement further asserted:

(The) Time has come for us to struggle together to achieve our common goal by surrendering one’s own interest and give room to accommodate other parallel bodies… We encompass all parties for a united struggle which is our loud and clear message.  We shall not demoralize our political vision by remaining aloof like the organizations under cease-fire pacts [NSCN-IM, NSCN-Khaplang (NSCN-K) and NSCN-Khole-Kitovi (NSCN-KK) are currently under ceasefire with the Government of India] whose interest is either higher autonomy or economic package… Their submissive policy at the cost of people’s blood and sweat has demoralized the revolutionary spirit, thereby losing people’s confidence at large.

Taking serious note of the ‘importance of people’, MNPF has adopted the motto “For the People,” the statement added, and identified, as the principal objective of the MNPF, the restoration of sovereignty and right to self-determination. Another objective was to bridge the gap between all revolutionary groups of the region – Assam, Arunachal Pradesh, Meghalaya, Mizoram, Manipur, Nagaland and Tripura. The outfit promised to eliminate social and economic disparity among different communities and strengthen “cohesion and revolutionary unity” for a strong and vibrant federal administrative system.

Significantly, however, on June 29, 2013, the MNRF denied any dissolution of the group and warned those ‘attempting to tarnish the image’ of the group. A statement issued by Rex Kashung, ‘information and publicity secretary of MNRF’, categorically rejected the authority of John Francis Kashung to take any action on behalf of the group, accusing him of creating confusion among the people, while also pointing out that he had already been terminated from the party for misconduct and ‘corrupt thought’. While extending its best wishes on the formation of MNPF, the statement urged the MNPF not to adopt the logo of MNRF.

Both MNRF and UNPC were formed in 2008.

The creation of UNPC was formally announced in Senapati District on May 19, 2008, with cadres comprising of a splinter group of the NSCN-IM. Its ‘president’, S.S. Max, declared that the UNPC sought to restore peaceful co-existence amongst the people living in both hills and valley and to safeguard the territorial integrity and sovereignty of Manipur. He also disclosed that the outfit was led by two ‘colonels’, one ‘major’, two ‘captains’, two ‘junior lieutenants’, three ‘second lieutenants’ and 20 trained cadres of the NSCN-IM, who had defected in April 2008 and had formed the UNPC on April 30. The UNPC has an armed wing called Ching-Tam-[Hill Valley] Liberation Army (CTLA).

MNRF was formed in 2008 under the leadership of Allen aka Atai Siro as its ‘commander-in-chief’. On December 20, 2010, while talking to a select group of media persons, Siro stated, for the first time, that MNRF had been formed in March 2008 after a ‘brainstorming discussion’ with the like-minded persons, especially for peaceful co-existence amongst all the communities living together in Manipur under the motto, ‘Unity, Independence and co-existence’. Siro noted that the Meiteis and other tribes, particularly the Tangkhul, have had close historical links since time immemorial, and “our forefathers used to tell us many stories that relate to this undeniable fact”. However, he observed, some underground organizations like NSCN-IM have been hell-bent on Manipur’s disintegration. MNRF, by contrast, stood firmly against such ill-conceived policies of NSCN-IM. Siro asserted, further, that ‘one of the major principles of MNRF’ was to protect the territorial integrity of Manipur, and the group would not let any underground organization break up ‘Sana-Leipak’ – the Golden Land (Manipur).

Both UNPC and MNRF have been involved in incidents of extortion, threats and intimidation, since their formation.

In a recent incident, on February 14, 2013, an assistant driver of a truck received bullet injuries when some unidentified persons opened fire at Mawai junction under Kasom Khullen Police Station in Ukhrul District. Police later recovered four spent cartridges of an AK rifle from the spot. MNRF claimed responsibility for the incident. According to a statement signed by the MNRF ‘information and publicity officer’ 'major' Maxstone, truck owners and businessmen engaged in the timber business between Kasom Khullen and Kamjong areas had been ‘requested’ to extend monetary support to the organization since 2011. In April 2012 some money had been collected from truck drivers and owners. From 2013, MNRF had demanded that truck owners and businessmen pay the same amount of ‘tax’ as they were paying to NSCN-IM. The refusal of the truck owners and businessmen led to the firing incident.

The incident militates against the MNRF’s May 2009 commitment that it would not collect house tax/ration tax, or, in any way, ‘betray the public’, even as the group criticized NSCN-IM for acting like a government and imposing ‘taxes’. The MNRF had accused NSCN-IM of awarding contracts for supplies and projects to a few hand-picked contractors/suppliers and projecting candidates of their choice in elections. The people in Manipur, the MNRF declared, had been suffering due to NSCN-IM’s ‘tyrannical activities’, and funds released by the Government had been going to the NSCN-IM.

On June 5, 2011, two powerful explosions went off one after another in the residential compound of the former United Naga Council (UNC) speaker, Simthi Ruivah, in Ukhrul District. Ruivah is the co-convenor of the Tangkhul Coordination Committee (TCC), formed by the Tangkhul Naga front organisations in the aftermath of the Manipur Government's decision to bar NSCN-IM General Secretary Th. Muivah's visit his hometown, Somdal in 2010. It was speculated that the incident was linked to the MNRF diktak; MNRF had served a quit notice to all the Tangkhul Naga front organisations on May 11, 2011.

In another incident, on January 25, 2011, Assam Rifles troopers rescued six Naga youths who were lured by promises of employment in Moreh, but were later taken away for recruitment to an MNRF camp near Tamu in Chandel District.

On March 12, 2012, in the wake of an extortion demand served on private schools by an armed group in Ukhrul District, the Joint Action Committee for Welfare of Private Schools (JAC-WOPS) appealed to responsible organization to refrain from such activities and honor the sanctity of the schools. Reports indicated that suspected UNPC cadres had served a demand of INR 50,000 on each private school located in Ukhrul.

Security Forces, meanwhile, managed to arrest some of the cadres of both outfits. According to South Asia Terrorism Portal (SATP), nine militants each of MNRF and UNPC have been arrested since the formation of these groups. Five UNPC cadres have also surrendered thus far.

NSCN-IM had received another blow when the Zeliangrong United front-ZUF was formed in February 2011. ZUF sought to promote the interests of the Zeliangrong tribes, and also propounded its belief in the oneness of the Hill-Valley people, and in the peaceful coexistence of different ethnic groups.

On July 5, 2012, a day after ZUF accused NSCN-IM of practicing ‘anti-Naga policies’, MNRF, alleged that there was a problem wherever NSCN-IM was. MNRF publicity secretary Apam Ningshen declared that for the Tangkhul Naga community, every village or area had problems due to the involvement of the NSCN-IM in ‘petty matters’. On April 25, 2011, condemning the ambush laid on the convoy party of Phungyar Manipur Member of Legislative Assembly (MLA) Wungnaoshang Keishing, MNRF stated that the Kamo (South) Tangkhul people of Phungyar areas in Ukhrul District had realised the nepotism, partiality and dirty policies of NSCN-IM, even though they were from the same community. On April 15, 2011, eight persons, including six Policemen, were killed and six injured in an ambush laid by the NSCN-IM on the convoy of the Phungyar MLA near Riha village in Ukhrul District. On April 19, 2011, NSCN-IM had accused Wungnaoshang of working hand in glove with the Ibobi Government's policy to ‘disintegrate Naga territories’ by creating a new cosmopolitan District, Phungyar. Keishing, who supported the initiative, had also been warned of “drastic action” by the UNC, if he did not withdraw his support for the new District.

On July 24, 2011, again, the NSCN-IM killed a couple, Varengam and his wife, at Lungpha village in Ukhrul District. However, ‘expressing regret’ for killing Varengam's wife, NSCN-IM stated that Varengam was killed because he was working with MNRF, which was allegedly working with the State Government.

The MNRF is also believed to have established relations with the United Peoples Party of Kangleipak (UPPK), outfit that has been expelled from CorCom. A February 4, 2013 report indicated that 44 UPPK cadres who were `rescued` by a team of Thoubal commandos on February 3, had come from a camp which the outfit shares with the MNRF and the Kamtapur Liberation organization (KLO) of Assam, at Leipok in the Tamu Sub-division of Myanmar.

Amidst all these developments, on June 27, 2013, Union Home Minister (UHM), Sushil Kumar Shinde claimed that the Centre was working ‘seriously’ to secure an early solution in the ongoing Indo-Naga political talks between the GoI and some Naga groups.

MNRF and UNPC have come together in the aftermath of the formation of CorCom, visualized as a ‘strong united front’ by the Valley-based Meitei groups. The possibility of a coming together of the newly united Naga groups with the Valley based outfits, given the similarity of their declared ideologies and objective of preserving the territorial integrity of Manipur, appears to be crystallizing. The NSCN-IM, in such a scenario, would be at loose ends.

Civilians

Security Force Personnel

Terrorists/Insurgents

Total

INDIA

Jammu and Kashmir

Nagaland

Left-wing Extremism

Andhra Pradesh

Jharkhand

Maharashtra

Total (INDIA)

PAKISTAN

Balochistan

FATA

Khyber Pakhtunkhwa

Punjab

Sindh

Total (PAKISTAN)