By- Times of Assam - December 16, 2016
Much was talked and hyped about the muscle power of recent Indian diplomacy on its neighbors such as Bangladesh, Myanmar and Bhutan in terms of controlling militancy in India’s troubled north east. Sheikh Hasina led Bangladesh particularly had handed over key leaders of militant outfits such as ULFA, UNLF and NDFB during the reign of Manmohan Singh as the Indian Prime Minister. Almost all camps of ULFA particularly were shut down in Bangladesh. The outfit was forced to flee from Bangladesh, thereby limiting itself to the camps of Myanmar which was operationally not convenient for the outfit to carry out strikes in Assam.
However from reliable sources there have been reports that ULFA has been able to re-open their old camps and hideouts in Bangladesh in recent days. Particularly, the camp in Sherpur area of Bangladesh which was one of the most active camps for the outfit in the nineties till 2009 has been re-opened. It is to be mentioned that earlier this year in February, it was the same region where Bangladesh’s Rapid Action Battalion had recovered a huge cache of ammunition which was believed to be of ULFA. This consignment included 22000 rounds of sub-machine-gun ammunition, 17000 rounds of light machine gun ammunition and even 2000 anti-aircraft missiles. Sherpur has been a strategic place for the ULFA in transferring arms and ammunition procured from Chinese firms and brought in through the sea route.
The sources have also indicated that this time ULFA has been able to reopen camps right under the nose of Sheikh Hasina’s government. ULFA’s Second-in-Command, Dy-CS Colonel Drishti Asom is reported to be leading this mission in Bangladesh. Reports suggests that he is able to influence Sheikh Hasina’s politics as he has knowledge about Sheikh Hasina’s party men’s corruption, money laundering through hawala and several other confidential information, which if made public can even topple the government. It is to be noted that several years ago, Sheikh Hasina was attacked through grenade in 2004 during her election campaign where about 25 people were killed and the attack was reported to be carried out by a small team of ULFA cadres led by Rubul Ali (Who hailed from Nalbari and was later killed in 2006 in an ambush at Mendipothar, Meghalaya)
The ULFA along with other insurgent groups of the region had jointly intensified its violent actions against Indian Security forces in recent days. The reappearance of ULFA in Bangladesh seems to be clearly a rise of the outfit once again.
https://www.timesofassam.com/breaking-news/indian-diplomacy-failed-ulfa-i-reopens-camp-bangladesh/
