KHALISTAN EXTREMISM MONITOR
A project of the Institute for Conflict Management
A project of the Institute for Conflict Management
04-Oct-2012
To discuss over a memorial inside the Golden Temple (Amritsar District) for those who died in Operation Blue Star, UMHA decided to send a team of officers to Punjab. A section within the intelligence and security establishment also expressed concern and told the ministry about the repercussions of having such a memorial inside Golden Temple.
30-Sep-2012
British national Jaswant Singh Ajad, actively working for banned militant organizations BKI, KZF, and KTF was arrested from the Focal Point area of Jalandhar District. An Italian made 9 mm pistol and two magazines having 15 rounds were recovered from him. He has a strong relationship with the banned militant organization BKI led by Wadhwa Singh Babbar, KZF led by Ranjit Singh Neeta, KTF led by Jagtar Singh and Parpinder Singh of Scotland and others. Ajad was financing the militant modules to reunite them, he was also managing the sleeper cells of militants by providing them money, networking, and hideouts. A case under sections 120-B, 121, 121-A IPC, 25 Arms Act 10, 13, 17, 18-B, 20, 38, 39, 40 of Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act 1967 has been registered against him.
24-Sep-2012
The FIR registered against Panch Pardhani leader and former militant Daljit Singh Bittu names three others believed to be in Pakistan those booked by Police are Wadhawa Singh, ‘chief’ of the Babbar Khalsa International (BKI), Ranjit Singh Neeta of the Khalistan Zindabad Force (KZF) and Jagtar Singh Tara of the Khalistan Tigers Force. Daljit Singh Bittu was arrested by the Police on September 21, 2012, and has been booked under the Arms Act, Explosives Act and for anti-national activities. The police had raided his residence and office and also confiscated the laptop and computer found there. Bittu has also been accused of threatening witnesses of the 2007 Shingar cinema blasts, which killed six people and injured thirty. The FIR says Bittu and three other militants were planning to revive terrorism in Punjab. Bittu has been accused of promising to provide a hiding place for the men. Meanwhile, police are reportedly trying to piece together the funding trail. Police revealed that they know where this money is coming but for courts, we need concrete proof. Moreover, need to check whether this money is or will be used to spread violence in the state.
06-Sep-2012
Nehchal Sandhu, Intelligence Bureau (IB) Cheif, stated that militants focusing on Punjab and neighbouring states posed a challenge. Intelligence Inputs revealed that Pakistan based BKI Chief Wadhwa Singh Babber’s group and other militancy groups like KCF and KZF are making efforts to destabilize Punjab. Fresh inputs also indicate that Jagtar Tara, one of the three assassins of late Punjab CM Beant Singh, who is absconding following his escape from a Chandigarh jail in 2004, was playing an active role in trying to revive militancy.
04-Sep-2012
Minister of State for Home Jitendra Singh on Lok Sabha mentioned that Pakistani Intelligence agency ISI providing patronage and assistance to various Sikh militancy in Punjab. Arrested Sikh militants revealed that short term modules are being run in Pakistan for training gullible Sikh youths from India and abroad.
03-Sep-2012
According to NIA, more than two dozen websites and 50 groups on social networking sites trying to revive movement for an independent Sikh state. Some sites are www.neverforget84.com and www.prisonerwelfare.com. These sites have videos, images, and details of prisoners and militants who died during the 1984 riots and Operation Bluestar. According to an NIA official, “The ISI is also reportedly keen on forging coordination between Khalistani militants, militants operating in J&K and some fundamentalist groups and in this process Jagtar Singh Tara who escaped from Burail Jail in 2004 is favoured by the ISI to revive the Khalistan movement.”
03-Sep-2012
Investigation revealed that the terror outfit, BKI has active support from ISI. It received more than INR 800 million in the last four years to fund its militants. The probe has also revealed that a joint committee is in place to coordinate the activities of major militant organizations in which Gurdial Singh Lalli of ISYF, Resham Singh of BKI and Harmeet Singh of Komagata Maru Dal of Khalistan are the prominent leaders. NIA has initiated a probe into the funding of BKI and is soon going to register a case against it and foreign NGOs under the UAPA and the IPC. According to the investigators, there are other NGOs based in Canada, UK, and Germany who have donated money to BKI’s cause for revival of the Khalistan movement. The agency has found that a chunk of money came via hawala (illegal money transfer), legal bank transfers and human courier.
02-Sep-2012
The Minister of State for Defence M.M. Pallam Raju, while inaugurating NCC Academy constructed at Rupnagar District in Punjab, stated that the security mechanism at the Indo- Pak border would be further strengthened to deal with smuggling of narcotics in Punjab from across the border.
01-Sep-2012
The Mohali Police arrested a BKI militant, Kulwant Singh alias Guddu, who was arrested from Sahora village, near Kharar in Mohali District. A .315-bore double-barrel pistol, 11 live cartridges, some letter pads of BKI and some other objectionable material has been seized from his possession. He planned a major extremist operation in Punjab during the forthcoming festival season. Guddu was trying to recruit members in a bid to revitalize BKI. He was liaising with senior BKI militants abroad to revive the outfit. He planned to murder someone but Police did not divulge further details. Punjab Police are now trying to identify the people Kulwant was working with.
29-Aug-2012
Police recovered 12 mobile phones during their recent search to locate a tunnel on the Nabba Jail (Patiala) Premises’ gymnasium. Sikh militants lodged in Nabha jail were illegally running a gymnasium and were in touch with fugitive militants living abroad on the mobile phone. The jail has a total of about 650 inmates, but the gym facility was being used "exclusively" by the 50-odd Sikh militants. The entire equipment was seized by the Police on August 24. The gymnasium was set up by the pro-Khalistan Sikh Organisation for Prisoner Welfare (SOPW). Mobile call details of jail inmates revealed that the militants were in constant touch with their colleagues in Germany, the UK, other European countries, the US and the Middle East. Possibilities are there that militants were using voice over internet protocol (VOIP) technology to make overseas calls. Mobile tower locations have shown that the calls were made not only from the jail but also from places en route to the District courts. The SIM cards were purchased based on fake identities.
29-Aug-2012
The NIA is set to take over a case involving the recent seizure of narcotics, FICN, and arms in Amritsar (Punjab) in one of its first cases of narco-terrorism. The Punjab Police in July arrested five persons near the Pakistan border with arms, FICN and narcotics. Investigations suggested that people from across the border too were involved in the smuggling, after which the Home Ministry is learned to have written to the Punjab chief secretary that the case should be transferred to the NIA. The Punjab Police’s seizure comprised 11.5kg fine-quality heroin, valued at INR 600 million in the international market, besides INR 500,000 in FICN, an Italian pistol with live cartridges, and a mobile phone with a SIM card issued in Pakistan. An NIA team has visited Amritsar in connection with the narco case.
24-Aug-2012
Following information about a tunnel being dug at the jail by people belonging to BKI, a search operation was carried out in Nabha Jail in Patiala District. DIG mentioned that information about some illegal activities like selling drugs, misusing mobile phones were taking place inside the jail. And some equipment used for digging, opium, 12 SIM cards, some mobile phones, broken SIM cards, and cash recovered. A case has been registered in this regard and investigation will take place. Police will obtain the GPRS and the CDR data to know the details of the mobile phones being used inside the jail premises.
22-Aug-2012
Drugs, arms, and FICNs brought from Pakistan and Dubai were seized in Bhatinda District. Several arrests have been made in separate such incidents. In one such incident, suspects Jora Singh and Bhagwan Singh of Ferozepur District bought heroin from Pakistan on August 18 and ran away from the border when challenged during smuggling. BSF then found seven kilograms of heroin and FICN worth 573,000 dumped on the spot. The counter-intelligence Police at Barnala claimed to have arrested suspects Paramjit Pamma and Gurjant Singh with 120-kg poppy husk and 250-gm opium.
26-Jul-2012
BSF has recovered three pistols and one-kilogram heroin valued at INR five crore, near Border outpost D.S. Pura, (Amritsar Sector) near India-Pakistan border. Troops reacted swiftly and challenged the Pakistani intruders who fled back taking advantage of darkness and undulating ground but dropped the contrabands in the fields which were recovered later.
13-Jul-2012
Union Home Minister P. Chidambaram said that the threat of terrorism remains in Punjab and also expressed confidence about the government's ability to tackle any attempt to thwart peace in the border state. He commented, ''Punjab is by no means free of all terrorism-related activities. We are keeping a watch. We have inputs that some individuals and groups are busy trying to revive terrorism in Punjab. Nine arrests were made in 2011 and 47 in 2010. Besides 5kg of RDX was recovered from near Ambala and two activists of BKI were arrested from Delhi”.
10-Jul-2012
A local court of Chandigarh, awarded three-year Rigorous Imprisonment (RI) to four people, including an alleged ISI agent, in a three-year-old FICN case. The Court of Additional District and Sessions Judge Surinder Sahni convicted Savinder Kaur, Yudhvir Singh, Ravi Kumar, and Raj Kumar Gill and also slapped a fine of INR 5,000 each.
10-Jul-2012
According to the Public prosecutor, Savinder Kaur, an ISI agent, had visited Pakistan on various occasions over the past few years and she had been purchasing the fake currency notes from her counterparts in Pakistan and sold the fake currency notes to Yudhvir, this gang operated in various districts of Punjab.
03-Jul-2012
State Special Operation Cell, Amritsar, a unit of Counter Intelligence wing of Punjab Police arrested three cross border smugglers, identified as Dilbagh Singh, Bikramjit Singh and Gurpartap Singh in Ram Tirath Road, Amritsar and recovered INR 5 lakh FICN, 1 pistol, 38 live cartridges and Pakistani mobile phone set.
14-Jun-2012
Police arrested two persons, identified as Gurcharan Singh and Manjit Singh, involved in an FICN racket, from Salem Tibri area of Ludhiana along with FICNs worth INR 25,000. The gang's leader Ranjeet Singh alias Jeeta is still absconding. According to the preliminary investigation, Ranjeet used to bring FICN, minted by Pakistan's ISI, from the Indo-Nepal border and hand it to his gang members in Punjab.
25-May-2012
Three Pakistan nationals, including the driver of a goods train from across the border and his assistant was among five persons detained at the Attari (Amritsar District) railway station after BSF soldiers spotted a bag containing FICNs with a face value of around INR 1.5 million and drugs were thrown from the train.