India, Bangladesh to work out joint strategies against ultras

Grabbing on to Dhaka’s offer to let the Indian security forces join search for the lurking insurgents inside Bangladesh, New Delhi is likely to work on a joint strategy with its neighbour.

The modalities for this are likely to be worked out during the two-day talks between Madhukar Gupta and Mohd. Abdul Karim, Home secretaries of India and Bangladesh respectively at Dhaka tomorrow.

New Delhi has given a list of 110 suspected camps of anti-India terrorists, that include their hideouts, transit camps and arms training sites, to Dhaka. However, as A K Mitra, Director general, Border security force (BSF) claimed the Bangladeshi authorities have offered to take the BSF jawans to all these places to verify India’s claims on the ground.

"India will also seek deportation of Indian militant leaders like ULFA's Paresh Baruah, Anup Chetia and Arabinda Rajkhowa as the outfit has been fomenting terror acts for a long time," a Home Ministry official said.

Recently Dhaka had admitted the presence of Chetia in the country and decided to hand him over to India. However, Chetia approached a local court and sought stay against the government’s action. So far, India has handed over seven wanted criminals to Dhaka without any reciprocal action.

Besides, India and Bangladesh would also discuss outstanding issues like the trans-border smuggling and illegal immigrants coming into India at the meeting.

Both countries have recently decided to take up joint patrolling of the India-Bangladesh border against smugglers and infiltrators.

Besides the two countries have also taken a decision to allow developmental works inside each other’s border belt, which were help up pending the settlement of boundary dispute between the two countries.

India’s three projects are stalled while at least 46 projects on the Bangladesh soil are in jeopardy due to the tension on the border. " we have taken this decision keeping in view the welfare of the border residents," A K Mitra, who had recently visited Dhaka, said.