Bid to counter ISI activities, infiltration

SHILLONG, August 23: A high-level meeting of police and civil officials besides nongovernmental organisations will be convened here soon to draw up an action plan to counter the unabated infiltration of Bangladeshis into Meghalaya and activities of Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI). The meeting is being convened by the state deputy chief minister, D D Lapang, in response to a memorandum submitted to him by the Khasi Students' Union (KSU) here today. Quoting a United News of India (UNI) report based on a home ministry survey indicating "on an average 1,000 Bangladeshis cross over to India illegally through its porous boundary every day," the memorandum expressed serious concern over the import of such mass exodus on Meghalaya whose inter-state and international borders are cent per cent porous. "With the ISI stepping up activities, it is only a matter of time that Meghalaya becomes a virtual Bangladeshi territory like Assam and Tripura," the KSU apprehended. Its fears are apparently based on what the survey noted. "Bangladeshis in Assam are in a position to influence the outcome of an election forcing all political parties to maintain a Bangladeshi appeasement policy in the state..." and "...infiltration is going on unabated as a large stretch of Meghalaya and Tripura remain unprotected," the survey said. The KSU President, Paul Lyngdoh, said a KSU delegation led by him held a 30-minute long discussion with Lapang on the twin threat of infiltration and ISI activities in Meghalaya. "The minuscule Khasi people will be wiped out within a short span of time if the influx is not checked," he said and accused the state government with procrastination. He, however, felt that most of the infiltration into the state was taking place through the inter-state border with Assam specially the Guwahati-Shillong Road and not through the international border. A totally ineffective infiltration branch has made the problem worse, he said and alleged the understaffed and ill-equipped branch to merely an "eye-wash".