THE Bangladesh Government seems to have lost the trails of the master minders behind the series of arms haul in Bogra in June -July last where the All Tripura Tiger Force (ATTF) militants involvement figured in the prima facie probe. Instead, it was the opposition Awami League supporters who were charge sheeted into the case. The Criminal Investigation Department (CID) which was entrusted to inquire into the country’s biggest arms haul not only failed to extract any inputs about the “Big bosses” from those arrested (including four ATTF cadres) but also their modus operandi has been criticised by the leading Bangladesh dailies.

“The ‘Godfathers’ behind the smuggling of over one lakh bullets and about 200 kilograms of explosives were not named in the charge sheets under pressure from political high-ups and the probe seemed half-hearted leading to fizzling out of the culprits”, police and intelligence officer were quoted as saying by the leading Bangladesh daily, The Daily Star. Though initially, the Bangladesh Rifles arrested four persons of Tripuri origin and also ATTF collaborators, Jugesh Debbarma, his son Chittaranjan Debbarma from Satcherri and Swapan Debbarma and Kishore Debbarma from Bogra immediately after the incident along with other Bangladeshi nationals, but the CID and the Task Force Intelligence which conducted the interrogations totally failed to penetrate the conspiracy involving 88,600 bullets and 163 kilograms of smuggled explosives.Surprisingly the police filed charge sheets against the Bangladeshi nationals, mostly Awami League and left the ATTF militants scoot free.

Bangladesh police also failed to nab the main suspect, Ashish Debbarma, the owner of the truck (DM-T11-3366) in which the ammunition were transferred to Nepal for the Maoists. The failure of the Bangladesh government to bring to light the activities of the ATTF militants in it’s soil is likely to hit the diplomatic ties between the two countries once again. Despite, the arrest of the four militant aides, the country has been constantly denying any militants infrastructure on its soil. Senior ULFA cadre Anup Chetia and his wife are already serving sentence in Bangladesh jail for entry without valid documents. Even the Bangladesh government failed to take any action against Jugesh Debbarma, in whose teak garden; the ATTF runs the Satcherri camp, which is hardly a mile away from the Simna border in Sadar north. Twenty years ago, Jugesh Debbarma used to sell rattan made mats but now an active militant aide and running the ‘Tripura Bahumukhi Samabay Samity ‘. But his main trade is financing militants and smuggling firearms.

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