After several notices and news analyses in the Western media about travel alerts by USA, Japan, Australia and the European Union for fear of militant flames of unrest in changing Bangladesh and ISIS claims of striking Bangladesh police, another Bangladesh news has struck a headline in the global media. It is the news of handover to India by Bangladesh of the captive ULFA leader Anup Chetia who was awaiting decision by the Bangladesh government on his more than a decade-old application for political asylum.
The New York Times, quoting The Associated Press correspondent from Gauhati, Assam (India) reported as follows: “Bangladesh on Friday (6 November) handed over a jailed Indian rebel leader whose group has been fighting to free the Northeast Indian State of Assam from New Delhi’s rule, officials said. Anup Chetia, a leader of the banned United Liberation Front of Assam (ULFA), was being brought to India from Dhaka, the Bangladesh capital, by a team of Indian federal investigators, Kiren Rijiju, India’s junior home minister, told reporters.
Home Minister’s hesitant admission
Chetia was arrested along with two associates in 1997 in Dhaka. They were convicted of illegally staying in Bangladesh and possessing fake passports, unauthorized foreign currencies and a satellite phone. Although Chetia completed his prison term of seven years, he was kept in a prison as his request for asylum was pending with the Bangladesh government.
On Wednesday, Bangladesh’s Home Minister Asaduzzaman Khan Kamal confirmed that Chetia has been handed over to India. ‘Yes, we have handed him over to India as per his wish that he wants to go home after completing his jail term here.’ The Press Trust of India news agency said Chetia was wanted for killings, abductions, bank robberies and extortion in India. Chetia fled India in the early 1990s and was living in Bangladesh where his group had a base.
Rijiju said India and Bangladesh have been cooperating on security matters following an intervention by the prime ministers of the countries. Bangladesh has handed over several ULFA leaders, including chairman Arabinda Rajkhowa, to India since 2010. India is currently holding peace talks with Rajkhowa. It is not known if Chetia will also join efforts by New Delhi to settle the insurgency in Assam state. However, another ULFA group, headed by Paresh Baruah, is opposed to peace talks with the Indian government. He is believed to be hiding in the Myanmar-China border area.”
Bangladesh Home Minister was not really as straightforward in acknowledging the handover of Anup Chetia to India as reported by the AP correspondent. Although the handover took place on November 6 and the Indian press reported it widely on November 11, Bangladesh Home Minister Asaduzzaman Khan Kamal in the morning of Nov. 11 told the local press he had no knowledge about the handover. About one and half hours later the same morning, Asaduzzaman Khan Kamal confirmed that Anup Chetia was released from protective custody according to rules to go to India if he wished.
‘Secret arrangements’
How he crossed over to India was his business. If one calls that “handover” of the detainee (on release) to India, one may say so. Indian Bangla newspaper Anandabazar Patrika reported that not even the Bangladesh Home Minister was privy to the secret arrangements for handover of Anup Chetia to India; the Home Minister was told about Anup’s handover by BGB to BSF after he reached Delhi.
The Daily News & Analysis (DNA) of the most popular Indian Hindi TV channel Zee News reported on the handover as follows: “Prime Minister Narendra Modi (on November 11) thanked his Bangladeshi counterpart Sheikh Hasina for facilitating the extradition and handover of United Liberation Front of Asom militant and leader Anup Chetia. ‘He wished PM Hasina on Diwali & thanked her for the help in fighting terrorism,’ the Prime Minister’s office said in a tweet. Earlier, Minister of State for Home Affairs Kiren Rijiju dubbed Chetia’s deportation to India as a major breakthrough which would help in cracking many important terror-related cases. ‘Would like to thank Bangladesh Prime Minister and the government for finally heeding to our demands’ Rijiju said, adding ‘This has been a long standing demand of ours that Anup Chetia be handed over to India and lastly it has become a reality. Anup Chetia is a senior leader of ULFA and his custody would mean that we can crack some of important cases in which investigation is going on’.
Anup Chetia, whose original name is Golap Baruah and was also known as Sunil Baruah, Bhaijan or Ahmed, is the General Secretary of ULFA. He is also one of the founder leaders of the group. He was born at Jerai Gaon in Tinsukia district of Assam.
The genesis
Chetia was first arrested in March, 1991 in Assam but was released by then (Assam) Chief Minister Hiteswar Saikia. On December 21, 1997, he was again arrested in Dhaka under the Foreigners Act and the Passports Act for illegally carrying foreign currencies and a satellite phone. He was sentenced to seven years of imprisonment by a Bangladeshi court and was being held at Kashimpur Jail located on the outskirts of Dhaka.
“Since his arrest in Dhaka in 1997, the Indian Government had been asking the Bangladesh Government to extradite Chetia. Dhaka had earlier refused to entertain New Delhi’s request on grounds that the two countries did not have an extradition treaty. After the 15th India-Bangladesh Home Secretary-level meeting at Dhaka, Bangladesh Home Affairs Secretary Mozammel Haque Khan had confirmed that Bangladesh has agreed to hand over Anup Chetia to India, which will send back Nur Hossain, prime accused in a case of seven murders in Narayanganj.
Despite the expiry of his prison term, Chetia was in jail under a 2003 High Court directive asking authorities to keep him in safe custody until a decision was taken on his asylum plea.”
In Bangladesh, the news was made the top headline of all newspapers, some of them quoting three versions of the Home Minister’s hesitant acknowledgement of his handover. Some activists of the ruling coalition who are reportedly targets of perceived Islamic militant threat for their “anti-religious” activism are further nervous for fear of ULFA retaliation being added to covert ISIS claims of murtad (rejectionist or slanderer of Islam) cleansing agenda. Awami League leaders, however, are saying there is no fear since Anup Chetia and his two associates under Protective Custody in Bangladesh had gone back to India on their own accord, and would probably take part in negotiations with the government of India for a Nagaland-like settlement of ULFA insurgency. While in Gauhati or in Delhi, Anup Chetia is still being projected in the media as a hardened seditious criminal, in his own village in Jeraigaon, the village head is reported in local media and in Bangladesh to be preparing along with Anup’s larger family members to accord him a hero’s welcome.
Source: Weekly Holiday