SOUTH ASIA INTELLIGENCE REVIEW
Weekly Assessments & Briefings
Volume 12, No. 27, January 6, 2014

BANGLADESH

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Hope Revived
Sanchita Bhattacharya
Research Associate Institute for Conflict Management
S. Binodkumar Singh
Research Associate Institute for Conflict Management

On January 5, 2014, Bangladesh conducted its 10^th General Elections. With a comprehensive boycott by the Opposition, as well as by some of Sheikh Hasina Wajed's allies, prominently including General H.M. Ershad's Jatiya Party (Ershad), 153 of a total of 300 seats in the Jatiyo Shangshad (National Parliament) were decided unopposed. Results for 136 of the remaining 147 seats for which elections were held, had been declared at the time of writing. Sheikh Hasina's Awami League (AL) had won 102 seats; followed by the Jatiya Party, 13; Independents, 13; Workers Party (WP), 4; Jatiya Samajtantrik Dal (JSD), 2; and others, 2.

Of the unopposed seats, AL candidate were declared unopposed winners in 127 seats; followed by the Jatiya Party, with 20 seats; JSD, with 3 seats; WP with 1 and Jatiya Party-Manju (JP-M) with 1 seat.

Only 11 of the 41 registered parties in Bangladesh participated in the elections. Despite this, according to Bangladesh Election Commission, the voter turnout was 45 to 46 per cent.

The elections were strongly opposed by the BNP-led 18 party alliance, and the run-up to the polls, as well as the election itself, were marred by street violence. At least 18 people were killed on polling day. 151 people have been killed in street violence since the announcement of the elections on November 27, 2013, in protests that combined opposition to the elections and to the War Crimes Trials, which had already sent one senior leader of the Jamaat-e-Islami (JeI) to the gallows .

A complex and high risk politics played out in the months preceding the elections, with parties increasingly polarized on virtually all issues. Eventually, however, the cards appear to have fallen substantially in favour of Sheikh Hasina's AL and its allies. The Opposition had been substantially mislead into believing that the 'international community' particularly led by the US, would not allow Bangladesh to go into an election that was widely boycotted. While there were some indications of a greater willingness in Washington to accommodate the BNP-JeI combine it if came to power in Bangladesh, and consequently, of a narrower band of tolerance for the Sheikh Hasina led alliance, any measure of external support for the Opposition quickly dissipated as the elections came closer, particularly in view of the rising crescendo of violence engineered by BNP-JeI cadres, as well as a result of the visibly increasing popular support to the War Crimes Trial (WCT) process. It is significant that Abdul Qader Mollah, the notorious 'butcher of Mirpur' was hanged on December 12, 2013, barely three weeks before the election date, provoking both wild celebration, on the one hand, and violent protests, on the other.

While questions have been raised regarding the legitimacy of the present elections, it is significant that they have been held within transparent legal and constitutional parameters. Further, even before the elections, Sheikh Hasina had told the Opposition, including Begum Khaleda Zia, chief of the BNP, that while the current election to the 10^th Jatiyo Sangshad were already a closed issue, early elections to the 11^th Parliament were open to negotiations. Indeed, the present situation in Bangladesh is far from unprecedented and Sheikh Hasina has only reversed roles this time around. In the February 1996 elections for the 6^th National Parliament, with a comprehensive Opposition Boycott on the grounds that the Government had rigged Parliamentary by-elections in March 1994, Begum Khaleda's BNP had won all 300 seats, with just 21 per cent of votes polled. Significantly, at least 16 persons had been killed on election day, February 15, 1996. Elections to the 7^th Parliament were quickly forced just months later, in June 1996, and the AL secured 146 of 300 seats, with a voter turnout of 75.6 per cent, the highest in Bangladesh to date. The BNP secured just 116 seats.

The Opposition in Bangladesh is now caught in a cleft stick. Sheikh Hasina will evidently continue to strongly support theWCT in her new tenure. Six top leaders of the JeI and BNP are currently on death row, pending appeals, and the appeals process is likely to be exhausted within months, and in some cases, possibly more than that. Significantly, the ICT awarded the death sentence to Mollah on February 5, 2013; it took some ten months for him to exhaust the appeal process, before he was hanged on December 12, 2013. Bacchu Razakar was sentenced (in absentia) on January 21, 2013; Delawar Hussain Sayyedee on February 28, 2013, Muhammad Kamruzzaman on May 9, 2013; Ali Ahsan Mohammad Mojaheed, on July 17, 2013; Salahuddin Quader on October 1, 2013; and both Mohammad Ashrafuzzaman Khan alias Nayeb Ali and Chowdhury Mueenuddin on November 3, 2013. While Razakar is currently believed to be in Pakistan, and unlikely to be brought to justice, Sayyedee and Kamruzzaman could be sent to the gallows at any time. The only hope the BNP-JeI has of rescuing these leaders from execution is to accelerate the process for a new election, with a limited, if not slim, possibility of capturing power. Escalating street violence over the past year has evidently failed to weaken the AL regime's will to bring the perpetrators of the 1971 atrocities to justice. But if the Opposition comes to the negotiating table to hammer out terms for a new Election, the WCT process will continue to its logical conclusion - with lethal consequences for those on the death row. Moreover, Mollah's execution certainly found significant resonance among the people of Bangladesh, and was opposed (violently) only by a narrow spectrum of JeI-BNP cadres. Further executions of those guilty of the 1971 atrocities can be expected to widen the support base of the AL. Further, the JeI has already been declared an illegal formation, and is barred from participation in the Elections, and consequently unlikely to find a formal place on the negotiating table.

The present boycott of the 10^th General Elections was purportedly the consequence of the passage of the 15^thth Constitutional Amendment Bill on June 30, 2012, which overturned the 16-year-old requirement that general elections be overseen by a non-partisan Caretaker Government - a provision that was introduced into the Constitution in the wake of the February 1996 Elections, and that facilitated a political agreement to hold the June 1996 Elections.

While Sheikh Hasina has made it clear that she is open to negotiations for a new Election, the levels of existing, and now escalating, acrimony between the 'two Begums' make any early resolution unlikely. A pre-Election attempt to restore contact between the leaders of the AL and BNP only deepened bitterness and further polarized their rhetorical positions with the disagreement over the issue of formation of an Interim Government to conduct the January 5, 2014, elections resulting in a complete breakdown. Recent reports suggest that Khaleda Zia is under house arrest in Dhaka. Further, Sheikh Hasina has threatened to indict her for her role in the rising violence of the past months, declaring, on January 1, 2014, “We believe in justice. The Opposition leader would be charged with giving orders for killing and burning people to death in the name of (her) movement. Inshallah [God willing], her trial would be held on Bangladesh soil to this end, and we'll hold this trial.”

Indeed, the onslaught that the AL Government, in alliance with 14 other likeminded parties, had launched against Islamist radicals and their BNP supporters after coming to power in January 6, 2009, can only be expected to intensify in the coming months.

The BNP-led 18 parties’ Opposition alliance, including various Islamist extremist forces, has unleashed and sustained a relentless torrent of street violence through 2013. Hefazat-e-Islam (HeI), which came into forefront in mid-2013, during the course of the Long March on April 6, 2013, has also joined this violent formation. According to partial data collected by the South Asia Terrorism Portal (SATP), the country has recorded 379 fatalities, including 228 civilians, 133 Islamist cadres and 18 Security Force (SF) personnel, through 2013, in violence unleashed by the these Islamist radical groups. In comparison, fatalities in such violence stood at just three (one civilian and two terrorists) in 2012, and six in 2010. No such fatalities were recorded in 2009 and 2011.

SF personnel arrested at least 4,201 extremists belonging to various Islamist groups through 2013, as against 1,832 such arrests in 2012; 578 in 2011; and 958 in 2010. The 2013 arrests included 4,041 JeI-Islami Chhatra Shibir (ICS) cadres, 69 HeI cadres, 54 Hizb-ut-Tahrir (HuT) cadres, 27 Hizb-ut-Towhid (HT) cadres, four Harkat-ul-Jihad-al Islami Bangladesh (HuJI-B) cadres, three cadres each of Ansarul Bangla Team (ABT) and Jama'at-ul-Mujahideen Bangladesh (JMB).

Moreover, in its opposition to the War Crimes Trials, the opposition alliance called for hartals (general shutdown strikes) through the year, resulting in 91 days of disruption, according to partial SATP data.  The Dhaka Chamber of Commerce and Industry estimated the economic loss at about USD 200 million a day during the strikes. In an earlier statement, on June 20 2013, Bangladesh Railway Minister M. Mujibul Haque told the Parliament that Bangladesh Railway alone incurred a loss of BDT 240 million (approximately USD 3 million) as a result of hartals enforced by BNP-JeI since February, 2013.

The combined Opposition, however, was shocked when thousands of people demanding death sentences for War Crimes spontaneously gathered at Shapla Chattar, Shahbagh in Dhaka City. The resulting 'Shahbagh movement' with its Six Points, acquired immense support from Ganajagaran Manch (People's Resurgence Platform) and Muktijuddho Projonmo Oikya Forum, a platform of 13 organisations comprising freedom fighters’ children and their generation.

Despite the uncertainties of the situation in Bangladesh and the boycott of elections by the Opposition, the tactical advantage has clearly shifted in favour of Sheikh Hasina. The only instrumentality that the combined Opposition has in the situation prevailing after the elections is street violence, and this they have already deployed to the limits of their capacity, with little impact on the actions or intentions of the Government. Further escalation of this violence, though likely, is only going to provoke a further alienation among the people, undermining the prospects of the BNP alliance in any early General Election that may be negotiated. In the meanwhile, the WCT process will grind on, exposing the role of JeI and BNP leaders in the atrocities of 1971, and further delegitimizing these political formations in the eyes of the people, and of substantial sections of the international community.

INDIA

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Assam: Renewed Challenge
Giriraj Bhattacharjee
Research Assistant, Institute for Conflict Management

At least six persons, including five women, were shot dead by Karbi Peoples’ Liberation Tigers (KPLT) militants who attacked a Rengma village in the Khowanigaon area of Karbi Anglong District on December 27, 2013. Subsequently, two KPLT militants were reportedly killed in an exchange of fire with the Naga Rengma Hills Protection Force (NRHPF), a Rengma Naga militant formation. Apart from these killings, incidents of arson were also reported from the area. State Parliamentary Secretary for Home, Atuwa Munda, disclosed on December 30, 2013, that preliminary investigations had indicated that the imposition of a “tax” by the KPLT on orange cultivation, and the Rengma villagers’ refusal to pay, could be a reason for the violence. Two KPLT militants surrendered on January 1, 2014, and confessed of their involvement in the disturbances.

Earlier, a schoolgirl, identified as Purnima Rajak (14), was killed, and 17 others were injured in a bomb explosion near the Amolapatty railway crossing along National Highway 37 in Dibrugarh Town on December 17, 2013. The Assam Police blamed the Independent faction of United Liberation Front of Asom (ULFA-I) for the attack.

These incidents are not in isolation. According to partial data compiled by the South Asia Terrorism Portal (SATP), 101 persons, including 60 militants, 35 civilians and six Security Force (SF) personnel, were killed in 71 incidents of killing through 2013. Four of the 70 incidents of killing were major incidents (each involving three or more fatalities). In comparison, 2012 had witnessed 91 killings, including 45 militants, 31 civilians and 15 SF personnel, in 64 incidents of killing. The number of major incidents through 2012 was also four. Thus, while there was an increase in fatalities, it was not steep. However, the continuously declining trend since 2009, when fatalities were 392, to 158 in 2010, 94 in 2011, and down to 91 in 2012. Further, the number of districts from where fatalities were reported stood at 14 in 2013 as compared to 16 in 2012. Nevertheless, the current scale of violence is far below its peak in 1998, when the State recorded 783 terrorism-related fatalities. In 2014, the State has already recorded two civilian fatalities [data till January 5, 2014] 

The number of abduction cases in the State has also seen a recent spike. On December 29, 2013, media report quoted a Police official as saying, “In 2010, the state registered a total of 3,250 abductions, which was followed by 3,785 cases in 2011. Subsequently in 2012, the numbers went up to 3,812.Though the total figures for 2013 are yet to be compiled officially, it is estimated that almost 4,113 abductions occurred this year. On an average, some 350 abductions have been registered per month in Assam in 2013.” Most of the abductions are for ransom. In one such incident, KPLT militants abducted a trader, Maqbool Hussain (50), along with nine labourers from Bhalukjuri area of Karbi Anglong District on November 23, 2013. They were released a day later, against an undisclosed ransom allegedly paid to the outfit.

2013 also witnessed the arrest of 341 militants, in addition to 534 militants arrested in 2012 and 407 in 2011. In one of the major arrests, the Dima Hasao Police on December 11, 2013, arrested David Kemprai aka Action Dimasa, who joined militancy a decade ago as a cadre of the Dima Halam Daogah and later floated its Action faction DHD (DHD-A) with support from the Nationalist Socialist Council of Nagaland-Isak-Muivah (NSCN-IM). The DHD-A was floated after Action Dimasa escaped from Haflong jail on June 12, 2013. He had launched a massive extortion drive across the sprawling Dima Hasao District (4,890 square kilometres). Sustained pressure on the various rebel formations had resulted in the surrender of another 2,055 militants during 2013. Of these, 2,009 were cadres of the Dilip Nunisa faction of DHD (DHD-N), who surrendered en masse on March 9, 2013. The outfit had signed Memorandum of Settlement [MoS] with the Government on October 8, 2012.

In another positive development, a six months long tripartite Suspension of Operations (SoO) was signed between the Ranjan Daimary faction of NDFB (NDFB-RD), the Central Government and the State Government, on November 29, 2013. With this, the total number of insurgent outfits in Assam with which the Government is in talks has reached 13. At least 4,158 cadres of these groups are staying at designated camps at various places across the State. Worryingly, however, 33 militants of the Pro-Talks faction of NDFB (NDFB-PTF), nine militants of Pro-Talks faction of ULFA (ULFA-PTF) and 116 of the Karbi Longri North Cachar Hills Liberation Front (KLNLF) are ‘missing’ from their designated camps.

Amidst these positives, several concerns remain. Summing up the situation, Chief Minister Tarun Gogoi, while speaking at the Chief Ministers' Conference at New Delhi on April 15, 2013, observed, "In the past few years, there has been a declining trend of militant violence and talks are on with several militant outfits. However, it would be over-optimistic to declare that the nightmare of militant violence is over.”

Indeed, the Union Ministry of Home Affairs, while extending the term of the 'disturbed area' tag for the State for another year from December 4, 2013, stated, on November 23, that the "law and order situation in the State continued to be a matter of concern." Assam was first declared a 'disturbed area' on November 27, 1990.

On December 16, 2013, State Forest and Environment Minister Rockybul Hussain informed the State Assembly that six new militant outfits had emerged in the State in the preceding two years. These included the Karbi National Liberation Army (KNLA), United Peoples Liberation Front (UPLF), Dima Halim Daogah-Action (DHD-A), Dima Jadi Naiso Army (DJNA), National Liberation Front of Bengalis (NLFB) and United Dimasa Kachari Liberation Front (UDKLF). Five of the six new outfits were from the two Autonomous Hill Districts of Karbi Anglong and Dima Hasao, while the sixth is a Bengali outfit based in the Bodo Territorial Council area. The emergence of these six new groups took the total number of active outfits in Assam to 12. The six prominent active insurgent groups include the ULFA-I, I. K. Songbijit faction of NDFB (NDFB-IKS), KPLT, Kamatapur Liberation Organization (KLO), Muslim United Liberation Tigers of Assam (MULTA) and the Harkat-ul-Mujahideen (HuM, Assam unit). While the Government did not spell out the cadre strength of the new outfits, it disclosed that the six other prominent active groups have a total cadre strength of 760. Among these, the NDFB-IKS, with a cadre strength of 300, was the biggest, followed by ULFA-I with a strength of about 240 members.

While NDFB-IKS emerged as the most lethal group, with a confirmed involvement in 19 killing incidents, resulting in 25 deaths; this was followed by KPLT, involved in 11 confirmed incidents of killing, resulting in 16 fatalities. The Anti-Talks faction of ULFA (ULFA-ATF), which rechristened itself ULFA-I following its 'central executive committee' meeting between April 2 and 5, 2013, continued to maintain its strike capability, and was found to be involved in 12 killing incidents resulting in 14 deaths. Among these was a desperate attempt to retain his hold on the outfit by the outfit’s ‘commander-in-chief’ Paresh Baruah, who ordered the execution of seven of the outfit’s cadres as they were trying to flee their base in Myanmar. Two others in the group, who managed to cross over to India, surrendered to Police in Assam on November 20, 2013.

Meanwhile, ethnic turbulence continued to haunt the State. The year witnessed the emergence of a new ethnic faultline in the South Bank of River Brahmaputra. On February 12, 2013, at least 20 persons were killed in the Rabha Hasong Autonomous Council (RHAC) areas in Goalpara District, as violence engulfed the region during the third and final phase of Panchayat (village level local self Government institution) elections in Assam.

Referring to the ethnic and communal situation in the State, Union Minister of Home Affairs Sushilkumar Shinde, on November 21, 2013, noted that agitation for separate States by various groups had made lower Assam and Karbi Anglong "vulnerable to ethnic and communal" tensions. Unfortunately, the ethnic mistrust increased dramatically after the July 30, 2013, Congress Working Committee (CWC) declaration supporting the formation of a separate Telangana State, to be carved out of Andhra Pradesh, and its subsequent endorsement by the Union Cabinet on October 3, 2013. The earlier position taken by the Government was that no new States could, in principle, be established unless a new State Reorganisation Commission (SRC) had defined the fundamental criteria for such division. The reversal of Government’s earlier and principled stand resulted in the renewal of demands for various separate Tribal States to be carved out of Assam, including Bodoland, a Hill State comprising Dima Hasao and Karbi Anglong, and Kamatapur. On the other hand, the State Government has ruled out any division of Assam.

Meanwhile, the Communist Party of India-Maoist (CPI-Maoist) remained a worry. MHA Joint Secretary (Northeast) Shambhu Singh noted, on November 22, 2013, "Maoist presence in Assam and border areas of Arunachal Pradesh has been noticed and hence their activities were noticed in Golaghat, Dhemaji, Lakhimpur and Tinsukia Districts of Assam and Namsai area of Lohit District in Arunachal Pradesh." At least seven Districts, especially in the Upper Assam area, have reported significant mobilisation of the outfit, with an estimated strength of 114 in the State. Though the Maoists were not found to be involved in any single fatality in the current year, at least seven Maoist-related incidents were reported in 2013, in addition to 10 incidents in 2012, three in 2011 and just one in 2010. In one such incident in 2013, a three-member group of the CPI-Maoist raided a Police guest house at Borguri on the outskirts of Tinsukia town (Tinsukia District), and escaped with an INSAS rifle and 20 rounds of ammunition after injuring the sentry, Bipul Sonowal, in the night of October 1, 2013.

Managing the complex security challenges in the State has become the more difficult, given the depleted Police strength. On March 14, 2013, Minister Rockybul Hussain disclosed that the State Police was facing a manpower shortage; against a sanctioned strength of 72,461 posts, Assam Police had just 64,642 personnel. However, Assam has a better Police Population ratio, at 188 policemen per hundred thousand population, as against the national average of 138, though it still lags far behind the UN standard for peace time policing, at 220 per 100,000.

Civilians

Security Force Personnel

Terrorists/Insurgents

Total

BANGLADESH

Islamist Terrorism

INDIA

Arunachal Pradesh

Assam

Nagaland

Left-wing Extremism

Bihar

Chhattisgarh

Odisha

Total (INDIA)

PAKISTAN

Balochistan

Khyber Pakhtunkhwa

Punjab

Sindh

Total (PAKISTAN)