Suspicion of ISI agenda shrouds Kartarpur corridor

Punjab’s anxiety over the historic Kartarpur Sahib corridor link turning into an ‘ISI plot’ sooner or later to destabilise this border state isn’t entirely unfounded.

The apprehensions of Pakistan’s nefarious designs through the corridor link stems out of certain plausible conjectures, which is why Chief Minister Capt Amarinder Singh has minced no words, stating that the corridor link is an ISI agenda that will crop up sleeper cells in Punjab.

Even before Imran Khan was sworn in as prime minister, Pakistan Army chief Gen Qamar Javed Bajwa, shortly before the controversial hug with Khan’s friend and former cricketer Navjot Sidhu in Islamabad, had informed Sidhu about the decision to open the corridor link. This suggested that the decision to open the corridor with India was foreseen by the Army, much before an elected dispensation under Khan took over.

Intelligence inputs have indicated terrorist camps close to Kartarpur in Pakistan. There have also been some reports of infiltration into the Punjab side towards Dera Baba Nanak, which is the terminal point just 4-km to the revered Kartarpur Sahib shrine in Pakistan. India has shared its security concerns with Pakistan.

In the last two months, there has been a spurt in unsuccessful incidents from across the border to execute terror designs. Multiple attempts have been made to drop weapon payloads into Punjab using drones from Pakistan. Assault rifles, ammunition, satellite phones, drones and currency have been recovered by the police during a search operation carried out following the arrest of three terror suspects.

Punjab’s worries also stem out of the impending ‘Khalistan Referendum 2020’ mission, which supposedly has the backing of the ISI and radical organisations like the Sikhs for Justice. Exhibits of ‘Referendum 2020’ and posters of slain Khalistan ideologue Jarnail Singh Bhindranwale and other in an official video by Pakistan has further augmented India’s concern on ISI designs.

“There is a negative hidden ISI agenda behind the historic Corridor,” Amarinder has said, emphasizing ‘extreme caution’.

The CM has maintained that the intent is also to use the corridor to woo Indian Sikhs to promote the ISI-backed 2020 Khalistan Referendum and creating sleeper cells here.

Border state Punjab is a victim of ‘narcotic terrorism’ from across the border. In the last few years, Punjab has suffered multiple terror strikes, including one by Pakistan militants at the strategic Air Force base in Pathankot. Several terror modules have been busted amid apprehensions that Punjab was turning into the new theater of terror, after J&K.