Operation ‘Fox-Hunt’ (9 page)

He threw away his last cigarette and took a sip of coffee. Sanjay had never been married. His erratic lifestyle had not allowed for any romance. There had been women but never a girlfriend. His parents knew that he was a policeman and were very proud. In small-town India, an IPS in the family symbolised both power and prestige. They wanted him to marry as he was already over 35. This worried his mother a lot. He was not too bothered; he had other thoughts on his mind. Somehow travelling through Afghanistan, tracking down Naga rebels in Myanmar and avenging 26/11 in Baluchistan had made up for the lack of a relationship.

His guests were in around 1100 hours. An officer called him down to the conference room. Colonel Thakur from MI and Adnan Qureshi from the IB. Sanjay began the meeting with a briefing. He carried a document he had written after going through all the reports he could find over a period of the last two weeks.

“We have reports from all your agencies. The reports seem to be unconnected yet the NIA feels there is a pattern emerging. I will take you through them together so that we are all on the same page. We are to investigate the incidents and try and find a pattern if there is any. Two weeks back we received a report from MI that a 3rd Infantry division was being moved to the Kashmir sector. Our earlier reports collaborate that this was a surprise move. There was no plan even a month back to action this move. If the 3rd infantry division goes back to its old
positions it will be settled in by 15 December. It’s a corps reserve division, so why is it being moved out into middle of a counter-insurgency operation in the face of huge US pressure? We also have a report from MEA that the Pakistani PM has cancelled his trip to Africa dated 17 December. There was no immediate political or natural concern to trigger this cancellation. The next report is from our Joint Intelligence task force at Washington. A DIA listening station has picked up a conversation between a LET field commander in Kashmir and Inzamam Lakhvi. It mentions a Wasim Khan, area commander in Kupwara who died in an encounter. The conversation refers to the safe passage of the
mehman
or guests. It seems that the LET field commander is the older brother of Wasim Khan, and in the conversation Lakhvi let it slip that Wasim’s martyrdom will not be wasted, that the mehman will avenge the death. We also have an incident report of this encounter from the Army. Now let’s move on to our next report. Just one week before this encounter, the LET Muridke camp was emptied and its trainees shipped to various other camps around the country. A RAW asset at the camp has claimed that a week before, Air Force lorries took away twenty men out of the camp. He was able to note down the formation sign on the trucks. They were from Sargodha Airbase. We need to know why militants would be shifted to an airbase. These reports may or may not be connected. We don’t know. But there needs to be an investigation. Within seventy-two hours, we have to give a preliminary report.”

Pausing to drink a glass of water, Sanjay shuffled a file.

“We also have an asset in Sargodha. We will try and find out if he has anything to report. Incidentally we have reports that JF−17 squadrons based out of Sargodha, No 16 Black Panthers and No 26 Black Spiders have cancelled leaves and recalled aircrafts from joint exercises in Saudi Arabia.”

The JF−17s or the Joint Fighter 17s were the latest additions to the Pakistan Air Force (PAF) from China.

“Meanwhile the 9th and 11th squadrons with the F16s have been moved to Forward Operating Base for a joint exercise. It didn’t exist a month back. I will go through intelligence reports over the last month in context to today’s briefing and revert on the Sargodha matter as well,” he concluded.

Colonel Thakur (MI) spoke next, “There is a report from Signal Intelligence which has intercepted communication in POK between a Colonel of 15th Punjab and a Flight Lieutenant in the Air Force Police claiming that some Air Force commandos with the Special Service Wing (SSW) have damaged in a brawl, his unit’s Toyota Jeeps they borrowed. The 15th Punjab is a unit which also supplies logistics to Batala militant training facility on behalf of the ISI. He wanted to file a report saying the SSW had armed civilians in the vehicle. Now what surprises me is this, what were SSW commandos doing in a field unit? And if they were attached to an air station nearby, why would they borrow army Jeeps? Our analysts indicate that the circumstances and presence of civilians in the Jeeps show that they were at the LET spring-off camp in Batala village. What are SSW commandos doing in an LET camp? A note of this incident will be included in my report to the committee along with updates of the military movement of 3rd Infantry Division. Also we will be closing the interrogation of two captured militants in the Wasim Khan encounter. That should throw some light on the identity of the guests.”

Sanjay added from a report which had come in earlier in the morning.

“RAW has a source in Habib Bank in Lahore. He has access to accounts of a charity related to the LET, the Jammat-Ud-Dawa (JUD). He mentions a transfer of one million rupees each
to families of around ten men across small cities of Pakistan around three weeks back. The money was transferred to a private account from JUD, the charity front for LET. While these are standard transactions, a million rupees is a very high amount for being distributed to individuals at one go. That either means someone has completed a major operation or is setting off on one. We don’t have record of any major operation in either Afghanistan or India which should justify release of this sort of money to so many men in a single day. We anticipate that this money is only being released once the operation has been set in motion.”

“Maybe it’s for all the participants of a special training camp?” asked Colonel Thakur.

“Not really. Like I said this is too large an amount. We think it’s for something special. My men are going through the reports to see if there are any indicators.”

Sanjay closed the meeting saying, “Gentlemen, please carry on investigations on the subjects at your end and send in regular reports. We will meet again once we have enough to go further on, hopefully in a fortnight. Whatever we suspect is planned, is set to happen around 15 December. We have some time.”

6

Office of Military Intelligence (MI), Army Headquarters: New Delhi

C
olonel Thakur was in his office, smoking his Four Square Kings and downing cups of sweetened teas while going through a host of reports over the last six weeks. As he skimmed through Major Vijay’s incident report on the Wasim Khan encounter, he realised that the report carried a sting in its tail. It was Ankush’s description of a militant with military bearing that caught his eye. He quickly went over the report again and marked it for further action. He put a call through to the MI Colonel in the Kilo Force headquarters in Kupwara.

“Hi Ajay, how are you? I was going over a report from your boy in 27th RR. Damn good job. I want to have a word with him over the details of the operation. Have him call me ASAP.” They had a few words and exchanged some regimental gossip before they agreed to catch up when Ajay was in Delhi next.

A few hours later, Vijay called him, “Hello, Major Vijay here, sir”.

“Aha! Hello Vijay, I was expecting your call. How are you?”

“Doing fine, sir, I understand the call was about the Kupwara incident. I have the report in front of me.”

“Vijay, where is this Ankush chap? He was wounded, I read.”

“Ankush is in the Command hospital in Chandigarh, sir. The wound is not too bad but he was evacuated out of Srinagar to keep the bed empty for emergency as per my understanding.”

“Good. Does Ankush have a cell phone? I am sending across orders to deploy him on temporary duty to Army Headquarters (AHQ). Will you have a word with his CO anyway? Thanks then.”

With that arranged, Colonel Thakur went through reports from Batala area in POK over the last four weeks. There was a report of a newspaper journalist having been beaten up by some militants when he tried to take their picture as they shopped for some cell phone SIM cards and knick-knacks in the local market. The report claimed that the cub reporter was rescued by an Army officer in uniform who intervened and sent him on his way. The report was by an agent who happened to be on the street. Colonel Thakur tracked down the officer who was handling this particular informer to get an idea why this report had been filed.

“I know, sir, it’s pretty common for the militants to throw their weight around. But the handler claimed that these guys were not the standard rookies who end up in Batala normally; they were older and seemed to be non-Kashmiris. Batala usually has a mix of young disgruntled elements from Kashmir and POK. Usually the Punjabi and Pakhtoon militants stick to camps in Mirpur and Muzaffarabad. Oh, by the way, it isn’t in the report summary sent to you, but the detailed report I filed mentions that our agent actually knows this reporter. He is from the same village, and yes, he also claims that these characters haven’t been seen around in the last three weeks or so.”

“What did you say was this reporter’s name? Zain? And what publication does he work for … yes, please check your report. Yes, I will wait…
Mirpur News
is it? Thanks a million.” Thakur said as he disconnected the phone. The militants in the encounter
were all from POK or Kashmir, but it seemed the ‘guests’ might not be. Someone needed to talk to that cub reporter. There were mug shots of the dead militants and maybe he could describe his assailants. Thakur picked up the phone and put a call through to an officer who ran an undercover team in Muzzafarabad. He spoke to him for a few seconds, walked across the office to his desk and explained his requirement.

“Time is scarce,” he explained. “I will get the required authorisation from the NSA in an hour, you start the process.”

The NSA was reluctant to use a Black Op team and blow their cover. But the MI General was persistent. “The team has been in place too long, we are going to pull them out anyway sometime this year. Why not use them once.”

POK, Cub reporter’s house, Neelum Village, 22 November

Mustaq Ahemad had left his home town in Moradabad, Uttar Pradesh, almost fifteen years back. He still remembered the day when he entered the NDA at Khadakvasala near Pune. Those memories brought a rare smile to his face. Later from the Indian Military Academy (IMA), unlike most of his course mates who joined the fighting arms, Mustaq went ahead and joined the intelligence regiment. It was at various courses that he demonstrated exemplary presence of mind and a high aptitude for espionage. Following a string of field postings, Mustaq ended up in Afghanistan and helped guide and train the Northern Alliance’s (NA) intelligence units. After the US invasion of Afghanistan, Mustaq travelled with the invading NA troops, undercover into former Taliban territory. It was here that he heard of the secret air bridge created by Pakistanis to evacuate hundreds of ISI-sponsored terrorists and ISI officers who had been fighting the Americans. The deal had been made by wily Musharraf and was supposed to be a secret. The US hoped that
by doing the dictator this favour they could buy the loyalty of the Pakistanis. Mustaq investigated and sent a report back to India immediately. It was this report which eventually ended up in the international press leaving the Pakistanis and the US red-faced. Post the end of his mission in Afghanistan, using his contacts and the considerable influence Indian government wielded in the NA, Mustaq had himself placed undercover in Mirpur in POK.

He and his team of five enforcers were a product of a false flag operation conducted through a high-level intelligence officer in the Afghan intelligence unit, National Directorate of Security (NDS or Amaniyat). Mustaq and his team’s cover story collaborated that they were on the run from Afghanistan for attempting to blow up the Indian embassy in 2008. The papers had been falsely made through a clever move which replaced identifications in documents of a former Taliban, now deceased in the NDS archives. They were allowed to run a small tourist transport business in Mirpur using money given by the ISI. Mustaq and his Afghan ‘heroes’ bought a few imported SUVs. These they rented out to Pakistani military, political establishments and occasional tourists. It was a perfect cover for roaming around much of POK. The team had carried out mostly passive intelligence tasks like tracking militant activity, positions of key militant leaders and movement of Pakistani military units in the area surrounding Mirpur. There were some ‘hot ops’ too, a couple of hits against Afghan militants hiding in POK to satisfy the senior officer in the NDS. But this was the big one that had come their way in a year or so. Mustaq wanted to make sure it would be successful. It had been two years since they had been inserted into POK and Mustaq longed to get back to his country. It was the same for the four Afghans on his team. The tension of operating deep inside a hostile territory played havoc on their minds. He had been promised that this was their last
operation. He and his men would be extracted to India and he would return to a normal military career in India. His Afghans would become Indian citizens and would be allowed to bring their families to India and live out the rest of their lives with considerable pensions.