Recovery of arms in Bangladesh near Tripura border raises alarm

Around 15 rocket-propelled grenades (RPG), 510 rounds of machine gun ammunition and 25 boosters recovered

Indian security agencies are concerned after the recovery of a huge quantity of military-grade explosives and arms in Bangladesh, abutting Tripura, and are in contact with their Bangladeshi counterparts to know where these explosives were planned to be used, sources said Tuesday.

According to the reports, the Bangladesh Counter-Terrorism and Transnational Crime (CTTC) unit on Monday recovered the large cache of military-grade explosives and ammunition at Satchhari National Park in Habiganj, a spot four kilometres from the India-Bangladesh border in Tripura.

"Around 15 rocket-propelled grenades (RPG), 510 rounds of machine gun ammunition and 25 boosters, which are used as a propelling charge in RPG launchers, were found during the special drive at a place that is around 3-4 km off the border with Tripura," a source in the Indian security grid said.

Indian intelligence agencies recently submitted a report to the government that terror outfits like Jamaat-ul-Mujahideen Bangladesh (JMB) have been planning to carry out terror attacks not only in Bangladesh, but also in India. They have also reported that on the behest of Pakistan's ISI, the JMB also planning to destabilise the Sheikh Hasina government, which has also adopted zero tolerance to terrorism.

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The agencies also alerted the government that the ISI has been supplying terror outfits in Bangladesh with arms and ammunition, the sources in the security set up said, adding that all this was duly shared with Bangladesh intelligence on a regular basis.

The Bangladesh CTTC is also probing the target of these arms and explosives and sharing details with Indian agencies.

The security agencies in the neighbouring country have close coordination with Indian agencies and have always acted swiftly on Indian inputs on terrorism, drug trafficking and smuggling of counterfeit currency, the sources said.

Meanwhile, the Indian security agencies have tightened the vigil on the border, especially the sections where the fence is yet to come up, as well as boosting the Border Security Force's night patrol on the border areas in Tripura and other states.

Recently, the BSF has said that the fencing of 67-km-long stretch of the India-Bangladesh border in Tripura would be complete in 2022.

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