Writing for the Indian Express, Thapar has questioned the entire official story from New Delhi that claims that Jadhav is an innocent Indian citizen who was abducted by Pakistani operatives in Iran. Let's examine the Indian claims and Thapar's questions on it:
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| Indian Agent Kulbhushan Jadhav |
1. Jadhav's Two Passports:
Thapar asks why does Jadhav have two passports, one in his own name and another in the name of Hussein Mubarak Patel?
According to The Indian Express, the second passport was originally issued in 2003 and renewed in 2014. The passport numbers are E6934766 and L9630722. When asked, the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) spokesperson would only say that India needs access to Jadhav before he could answer. But why not check the records attached to the passport numbers? Surely they would tell a story?
Additionally, The Times of India claims that since 2007, Jadhav has rented a Bombay flat owned by his mother, Avanti, in the name of Hussein Mubarak Patel. Why would he use an alias to rent his own mother’s flat? Perhaps Jadhav changed his name after converting to Islam? But then, why did he deliberately retain a valid passport in his old name? Indeed, why did the government let him, unless he deceived them?
2. Abduction From Iran:
If Pakistan did abduct Jadhav, don’t we need to ask why, asks Thapar? Doesn’t that raise the question of what was so special about him that made them do this? After all, there are 4,000 Indians in Chabahar, Iran — and no one else has been abducted.
If Jadhav was indeed abducted from the Iranian soil, then why did India not pursue the matter with Iran, but, as the Indian foreign ministry spokesperson admitted, they don’t seem to have responded or, perhaps, even conducted an investigation yet. India seems to have accepted that. Odd, wouldn’t you say, asks Thapar?
3. Timing of Jadhav's Arrest:
Both The Indian Express and Asian Age suggest that Jadhav has links with the Pakistani drug baron Uzair Baloch who's also accused of terror in Pakistan. Did Jadhav play dirty with him and get caught in a revenge trap set by the drug mafia? Given that Jadhav was arrested a month after Baloch was taken into custody by Pakistan, this could be part of the explanation?
4. Jadhav's Pursuit of RAW Employment:
The Indian Express has reported that between 2010 and 2012, Jadhav made three separate attempts to join the Research and Analysis Wing (RAW). The paper suggests he also tried to join the Technical Services Division. What more do we know about this? Even if the media doesn’t, surely the government does? A. S. Dulat, a distinguished former chief of RAW, has unhesitatingly said Jadhav could be a spy. As he put it, if he (Dulat) was in the government, he would hardly admit it.
Summary:
Almost all of the Indian and western media have either been toeing the Indian party line or keeping mum about Jadhav. Karan Thapar, as a real professional journalist that he is, is the first non-Pakistani journalist to question the entire Indian official story on Jadhav. He has completely dismantled India's entire defense case and essentially confirmed that Jadhav's confession on orchestrating murderous attacks in Pakistan is factual.
Here's Kulbhushan Jadhav's video confession:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nVp62OinTeU
Related Links:
Haq's Musings
Why is India Sponsoring Terror in Pakistan?
Indian Agent Kubhushan Yadav's Confession
Has Modi Stepped Up India's Covert War in Pakistan?
Ex India Spy Documents Successful RAW Ops in Pakistan
London Police Document Confirms MQM-RAW Connection Testimony
China-Pakistan Economic Corridor
Ajit Doval Lecture on "How to Tackle Pakistan"
Chabahar Port
According to The Indian Express, the second passport was originally issued in 2003 and renewed in 2014. The passport numbers are E6934766 and L9630722. When asked, the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) spokesperson would only say that India needs access to Jadhav before he could answer. But why not check the records attached to the passport numbers? Surely they would tell a story?
Additionally, The Times of India claims that since 2007, Jadhav has rented a Bombay flat owned by his mother, Avanti, in the name of Hussein Mubarak Patel. Why would he use an alias to rent his own mother’s flat? Perhaps Jadhav changed his name after converting to Islam? But then, why did he deliberately retain a valid passport in his old name? Indeed, why did the government let him, unless he deceived them?
2. Abduction From Iran:
If Pakistan did abduct Jadhav, don’t we need to ask why, asks Thapar? Doesn’t that raise the question of what was so special about him that made them do this? After all, there are 4,000 Indians in Chabahar, Iran — and no one else has been abducted.
If Jadhav was indeed abducted from the Iranian soil, then why did India not pursue the matter with Iran, but, as the Indian foreign ministry spokesperson admitted, they don’t seem to have responded or, perhaps, even conducted an investigation yet. India seems to have accepted that. Odd, wouldn’t you say, asks Thapar?
3. Timing of Jadhav's Arrest:
Both The Indian Express and Asian Age suggest that Jadhav has links with the Pakistani drug baron Uzair Baloch who's also accused of terror in Pakistan. Did Jadhav play dirty with him and get caught in a revenge trap set by the drug mafia? Given that Jadhav was arrested a month after Baloch was taken into custody by Pakistan, this could be part of the explanation?
4. Jadhav's Pursuit of RAW Employment:
The Indian Express has reported that between 2010 and 2012, Jadhav made three separate attempts to join the Research and Analysis Wing (RAW). The paper suggests he also tried to join the Technical Services Division. What more do we know about this? Even if the media doesn’t, surely the government does? A. S. Dulat, a distinguished former chief of RAW, has unhesitatingly said Jadhav could be a spy. As he put it, if he (Dulat) was in the government, he would hardly admit it.
Summary:
Almost all of the Indian and western media have either been toeing the Indian party line or keeping mum about Jadhav. Karan Thapar, as a real professional journalist that he is, is the first non-Pakistani journalist to question the entire Indian official story on Jadhav. He has completely dismantled India's entire defense case and essentially confirmed that Jadhav's confession on orchestrating murderous attacks in Pakistan is factual.
Here's Kulbhushan Jadhav's video confession:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nVp62OinTeU
Related Links:
Haq's Musings
Why is India Sponsoring Terror in Pakistan?
Indian Agent Kubhushan Yadav's Confession
Has Modi Stepped Up India's Covert War in Pakistan?
Ex India Spy Documents Successful RAW Ops in Pakistan
London Police Document Confirms MQM-RAW Connection Testimony
China-Pakistan Economic Corridor
Ajit Doval Lecture on "How to Tackle Pakistan"
Chabahar Port
22 comments:
Why is PM Sharif not wanting to mention it to other world leaders?
Khan: "Why is PM Sharif not wanting to mention it to other world leaders? "
How do you know that?
Besides, India is doing a good job of bringing spotlight to Kulbhushan Jadhav in the ICJ, an international platform that receives wide coverage.
Was Kulbhushan Jadhav, #1 terrorist brought or talked about with Senator McCain?
Did US involvement in the 1980s is causing terrorism today in Pakistan?
Pakistan is suffering from terrorism and given sacrifice with 69000 lives in American war on terror?
What about 20000 RAW agents in Pakistan?
Deutsche Welle interview with US South Asia analyst Michael Kugelman:
http://www.dw.com/en/trump-administration-has-zero-patience-for-pakistans-terror-policy/a-39719898
DW: Is the US government finally taking a hard line against Pakistan?
Michael Kugelman: A tougher policy is certainly a strong possibility. If there is one US administration likely to take a hard line against Pakistan, it's the Trump administration. Trump projects himself as tough on terror and takes a very principled and strident approach to terror - it needs to be wiped out, wherever it is and in whatever form. It would seem that Trump would have zero patience for Pakistan's policy of going after some terrorists while letting others be.
There has been speculation that the US could expand the drone war and cut Pakistan funds. The harshest critics of Pakistan believe that the US government should revoke Pakistan's status as a major non-NATO ally or even declare it as a state sponsor of terror. These extremely tough policies may well be in the policy tool-kit, though my sense is that the aid cuts and drone strikes would be more likely.
Do you think the Trump administration could force Pakistan to act against the Haqqani Network and other Islamist organizations Washington considers a threat to its interests?
I'm not sure they could. In fact, the Pakistani security establishment may respond to more sticks and less carrots from the US by doubling down and tightening its embrace of militants like the Haqqani Network and Lashkar-e-Taiba.
If the US revoked Pakistan's status as a major non-NATO partner state in the war against terror, how would it affect the situation in Afghanistan?
This would actually be quite devastating for the Pakistani military, because it would probably translate into major reductions in military assistance and arms sales. Pakistan can depend on the largesse of other countries like China and Saudi Arabia, but Islamabad really values the military support it has received from Washington over the years. Revoking Pakistan's status as a non-NATO partner would put this support in doubt and worry quite a few people within the Pakistani security establishment.
The question, however, is if the US would actually go through with such a drastic policy shift. Frankly, I think it's unlikely, at least in the immediate to mid term. The US continues to have troops in Afghanistan, and in fact the Trump administration is poised to send more. So long as the US has troops in Afghanistan, it will need to depend on Pakistan to provide supply routes for US troops. Taking a harder line against Pakistan would likely prompt Islamabad to shut down these supply routes, obliging America to use more circuitous and expensive routes. This could make the US war effort in Afghanistan even more difficult than it already is.
Pakistan is important because of its geographic location and its geopolitical relationship, there's no doubt about that. There's no way that the US will consider Pakistan unimportant, given that it borders Afghanistan, where Americans are fighting their longest ever war, and given that it has deep ties to the world's next superpower (China) and growing ties with one of the world's most dangerous revisionist powers (Russia).
If cornered by the Trump administration, can Pakistan tilt more toward China and Russia?
Certainly a harder US line would send Pakistan deeper into the embrace of China and Russia. But I don't think we should overstate this risk. For one thing, Pakistan is already moving closer to Russia, and especially China. For another thing, the interests and objectives of Russia, and especially China in Afghanistan, are actually closer to those of the US than to those of Pakistan. China and Russia both want a stable Afghanistan and have no interest in Taliban rule. Pakistan, of course, has major ties to the Taliban and arguably benefits from an unstable Afghanistan in that it complicates efforts by India to have a deep presence there.
Chilling account of captured spy’s fate
Aradhika Sekhon
An Indian Spy in Pakistan
by Mohanlal Bhaskar. Translated by Jai Rattan. Shrishti. Pages 329. Rs 295.
http://www.tribuneindia.com/2004/20040222/spectrum/book8.htm
AN Indian Spy in Pakistan is the true account of Mohanlal Bhaskar, a spy and an Indian espionage agent in Pakistan. In his preface, Khushwant Singh says, "Not all the wealth of the world would persuade me to undergo what Mohanlal Bhaskar had to go through in the jails of Lahore, Kot Lakhpat, Mianwali and Multan. It is a miracle that after all that he lives to tell his tale, retain his sanity and teach in a school"
Bhaskar was on a mission to find out information about Pakistan’s nuclear bombs. Betrayed by one of his colleagues — a double agent who was also subsequently arrested and had to face his own demons. "Would he (Amrik Singh) be able to go back to his own country alive? And even if he succeeded in doing so would life be worth living? Would the Indian Government spare him? Such thoughts had driven him mad. The hunter was caught in his own net."
However, Bhaskar was condemned to prison and torture in an alien country where he was to spend 14 years of his life. Perhaps he would not have been allowed to emerge alive. His salvation came when he was exchanged for Pakistani spies held by India.
The novel, originally in Hindi, has been translated into English by Jai Rattan. Says Khushwant Singh "Jai Rattan’s translation from the original Hindi reads very well. I can recommend it to readers who have the stomach to take in suspense and horror"
Bhaskar got initiated into the profession of espionage when, fired with patriotism in 1965, he quoted the following lines in a speech on Bhagat Singh:
"We have eaten the grain cultivated with your blood,
It has nurtured the seeds of martyrdom in us"
While the audience applauded vociferously, one man questioned his sentiments to which Bhaskar responded, "If it’s a question of serving my country I will not be found wanting. I’m prepared to serve with my life and soul in whatever capacity you want me" And so silently that not even his family got to know of it, Bhaskar "quietly underwent circumcision and became a Muslim convert`85.even my wife was not aware of this momentous fact"
The novel is set at the time when "Ayub’s swagger had lost some of its bounce. Bhutto’s star was in ascendancy`85he had won over the people of Pakistan to himself, and was now hanging like Damocles’ sword over Ayub’s head`85martial law was proclaimed and the jails filled in no time`85It was during this period of turmoil that I had started making incursions into Pakistan"
The novel is full of descriptions of the torture that Bhaskar and other prisoners had to undergo at the hands of the Pakistani police and army. However, these accounts of inhuman torture are interspersed with descriptions of the many interesting people that Bhaskar came across in the Pakistani jails. People who were sadistic and cruel and people who showed unexpected kindness. For example he writes of Havaldar Abdul Rahman Khatak "who even in prison had helped me to keep up my morale`85his love and affection were like a fountain a desert which sprays cool, life giving water`85there was no hatred for me in his heart`85when I think of him my head is bowed in gratitude."
Another fact that Bhaskar brings to light time and again is the shared lineage and heritage of the people of the two warring nations. Raja Gul Anar Khan, who was considered to be "a living terror" traced his history back to Chandravanshi Rajputana while certain others had Sikhs as their forefathers but in turbulent times converted to Islam either by choice or necessity.
These and many other such colourful characters pepper the pages of the book, which in spite of its many printing errors, is an easy read.
Ex-Indian Army chief admits sponsoring terrorism in Balochistan
https://www.thenews.com.pk/archive/amp/461946-ex-indian-army-chief-admits-sponsoring-terrorism-in-balochistan
Recently retired Indian Army chief General Vijay Kumar Singh has admitted that India sponsored bomb blasts in Pakistan and doled out money to the separatist elements in Balochistan, a disclosure downplayed by the Indian media so far.
Buying silence of Kashmiri leaders in Indian held Kashmir and phone tapping inside India were also part of the sensitive report.The ex-army chief reveals this in an inquiry report prepared by India’s DG military operations shining light on activities of an army unit raised after the Mumbai attacks.
VK Singh last month announced a political alliance with BJP leader Narendra Modi who was responsible for the massacre of the Muslims in Indian Gujarat.A portion of the explosive report indicting the former army chief of terrorist activities inside Pakistan was downplayed by the Indian media that largely used ‘neighboring country’ as a reference and instead highlighted its parts relating to his activities of phone-tapping inside India and buying silence of politicians in Indian-held Kashmir through loads of cash.
The dirty tricks sanctioned by the top Indian general were carried out by Tactical Support Division (TSD), an Indian army unit raised after Mumbai attacks on the directives of the Defence Minister and National Security Adviser Shev Shankar Menon in order to “perform a particular task to secure borders and internal situation in the country.”
TSD consisted of six officers, five JCOs and 30 men and operated out of an unmarked two-storeyed building within the Delhi Cantonment dubbed the ‘Butchery’, that was a refurbished slaughterhouse of colonial times, The India Today reported.
“The division was headed by Colonel Munishwar Nath Bakshi, a tall, flamboyant intelligence officer in his early 40s, better known by an unusual nickname, ‘Hunny’,” it said.As the inquiry body was set up to investigate, Col Bakshi, a confidante of Gen Singh, got himself admitted in a mental hospital pretending that he was under serious mental stress.
Former Army Chief VK Singh allegedly used TSD, a clandestine collective of handpicked military intelligence personnel, to settle scores on both sides of the contentious Line of Control (LOC) between Pakistan and India, reported The India Today, in its October 7 edition.
Between October and November 2011, India Today reported this month, TSD had claimed money “to try enrolling the secessionist chief in the province of a neighbouring country” and “Rs1.27 crore (Indian currency) to prevent transportation of weapons between neighbouring countries”. In early 2011, TSD claimed an unspecified amount for carrying out “eight low-intensity bomb blasts in a neighboring country”, according to this weekly Indian magazine.
The Hindustan Times earlier reported about the covert operation inside Pakistan by TSD and quoted its former official stating it was assigned to nab Hafiz Saeed of Jamaatud Dawah but didn’t mention TSD’s involvement in terrorist activities in Pakistan as has been revealed through inquiry board.
Since there was no explicit mention of Pakistan, it didn’t emerge on the radar of Pakistani media. The News spoke to different journalistic sources in India privy to details who confirmed that it was about Pakistan.
India’s Director General of Military Operations (DGMO) Lt Gen Vinod Bhatia, who headed a Board of Officers’ inquiry under the direct orders of Gen Bikram Singh, current army chief, to review the functioning of the TSD submitted the report in March this year to the Indian government. While report is not being publicised, however, TSD was closed in December 2012.
Dirty Tricks: A politically ambitious general and a bungling govt put national security at risk
Former army chief Vijay Kumar Singh allegedly used the Technical Support Division (TSD), a clandestine collective of handpicked military intelligence personnel, to settle scores on both sides of the contentious Line of Control (LOC) between Pakistan and India.
Organising eight bomb attacks in a neighbouring country. Subsidising secession on enemy territory. Sponsoring 'friendly' ministers to destabilise an indigenous state government. Eavesdropping on senior government functionaries including India's defence minister. Former army chief Vijay Kumar Singh allegedly used the Technical Support Division (TSD), a clandestine collective of handpicked military intelligence personnel, to settle scores on both sides of the contentious Line of Control (LOC) between Pakistan and India. It was a secret war conceived by a reckless general between 2010 and 2012. And even 16 months after his unceremonious retirement, the general has not stopped fighting. Now the target is the Government, which is matching the general's tricks with its own. The collateral damage of the dirty war between the two is national security.
Barely 24 hours after his I-know-it-all proclamation on national television on September 23, that the Army had "transferred funds to all ministers in Jammu and Kashmir since 1947", Singh scurried for cover. His comments triggered a firestorm of indignant counter-allegations all the way from Delhi to Srinagar. The payouts, he insisted, were not "bribes" or for "political purpose", but part of the larger initiative to promote stability in the insurgency-ridden state. On September 27, just hours before Prime Minister Manmohan Singh was to meet his counterpart Nawaz Sharif in New York, the tenuous peace was shattered yet again when terrorists struck with twin attacks on a police station and an army post in Jammu killing 12 persons including four soldiers and two policemen. The attack underscored ground realities in India's most sensitive state. The general's clarifications, an almost surreptitious monologue delivered to select reporters on the lawns of his Sector 30 home in Gurgaon, are however only a brief pause in his long shoot-and-scoot war that has simmered since the Government refused to amend his date of birth in 2011. This would not only have given him 10 more months in office but also changed the expected line of succession for the Army's top job.
http://indiatoday.intoday.in/story/general-vk-singh-bungling-government-national-security-at-risk/1/312040.html
#Mattis tells #India to moderate its support of #TTP #terrorism in #Pakistan. #Afghanistan #talibans #RAW
by Bharat Karnad in Hindustan Times
http://www.hindustantimes.com/analysis/afghanistan-pakistan-and-the-f-16-mattis-has-to-hardsell-these-issues-on-his-visit-to-india/story-qvL9NS6wgl17sy756hE2WN_amp.html
"...as a former head of the US Central Command Mattis appreciates Pakistan’s indispensability as base for military operations to bring the Taliban in Afghanistan to their knees. But Islamabad has insisted that India’s role in Afghanistan be restricted and complained about the Indian support for the Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) accused by Islamabad of terrorism in Pakistan. The RAW-TTP link was publicly revealed in April this year by its former commander, Ehsanullah Ehsan.
Mattis’ request that India moderate its support for TTP will put Delhi in a fix because TTP is useful as an Indian counterpart of the Hizbul Mujahideen, Lashkar-e-Toiba, and Jaish-e-Mohammad deployed by the Pakistan Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) in Jammu & Kashmir. Severing relations with TTP will mean India surrendering an active card in Pakistan and a role in Afghanistan as TTP additionally provides access to certain Afghan Taliban factions. This, together with the Abdul Ghani regime’s desire for India’s presence and the tested friendship with Abdul Rashid Dostum and his Tajik-dominated ‘Northern Alliance’, ensures that no solution for peace in Afghanistan can be cobbled together without India’s help.
Mattis’ returning home empty-handed will not hurt relations with the US at all because there’s China; and the US needs India to strategically hinder it."
The Hindu editorial on the Jhadav episode:
“Most prison manuals in India mandate the removal of all metal objects and most accessories, while several prisoner-family meetings around the world take place across glass screens.”
http://www.thehindu.com/opinion/editorial/unseemly-spat-kulbhushan-jadhav/article22288593.ece/amp/
#India being disingenuous, #SushmaSwaraj being melodramatic about #KulbhushanJadhav meeting with his wife, mother in #Islamabad #Pakistan
http://indianexpress.com/article/opinion/columns/kulbhushan-jadhav-case-india-pakistan-relations-icj-i-spy-you-spy-5002907/
The current Indian NSA, Ajit Doval, doesn’t look like either Rahab (in Bible Old Testament) or (James) Bond but I am certain he wasn’t just lurking around Data Durbar in Lahore during his seven years in Pakistan, by his own admission, if I might add.
If Angela Merkel can find the National Security Agency infiltrating her BlackBerry, it would need a special kind of schmuck to think that India and Pakistan do not spy on each other or that while Pakistan is a villainous state, India is a member of The Religious Sisters of Mercy. That doesn’t take the conversation anywhere.
So, how should the conversation go? Perhaps one can begin with Doval’s own hard-nosed offensive realism. Personally, I like that because it eschews the sweet-mouthed nothingnesses of Track 2 and throws us into the deep end in Balochistan where, incidentally, we found Commander Kulbhushan Jadhav, or is it Hussain Mubarak Patel.
He is not the only one in Pakistan’s custody. There are others, too, being tried or sentenced on charges of spying. But Jadhav is the only one for whom India has invoked the International Court of Justice (ICJ). Clearly, he means a lot to India.
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In the ’90s, India and Pakistan would, with some regularity, charge some staff in the respective missions as spies (undercover postings) and declare them persona non grata. As with all things India and Pakistan, there was reciprocity. The irony is that once both sides managed to PNG all the “eyes” from their respective missions, they were left largely blind. Such is the nature of the game that you need yours over there so you have to tolerate theirs over here. At that point, the entire situation looks like the abusive marriage between Martha and George in Albee’s Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf.
The Jadhav episode has to be seen at two levels. One, his activities were in line with India’s Modi-Doval policy of waging covert, sub-conventional war against Pakistan, using and exploiting the latter’s faultlines to get a force-multiplier effect. Two, there’s reason for Pakistan to give a high-profile treatment to the Jadhav case: India is no babe in the woods when it comes to “terrorism”.
That Jadhav is important for India is a no-brainer and can be evidenced by New Delhi approaching the ICJ. According to Pakistan’s foreign minister, Khawaja Muhammad Asif, there was also a proposal for a swap: “The terrorist who killed children in APS [Army Public School] in Peshawar is in Afghan custody. The National Security Adviser [NSA] told me that we can exchange that terrorist with the terrorist you have, which is Kulbhushan Jadhav.” He was speaking at the Asia Society in New York in September this year.
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By Jadhav’s own account, after he revealed his identity and rank, he was treated with the protocol given an officer. Of course, India has alleged that his confession has been coerced. There’s nothing surprising about that statement. It was a good gesture to get him to meet his wife and mother. The media spectacle should have been avoided, given the unprofessional enthusiasm of TV channels in the Subcontinent. The MEA statement, however, was disingenuous about change of clothes and withdrawal of certain other items because that is standard operating procedure to ensure the visitors are not carrying, wittingly or unwittingly, any relaying devices.
Predictably, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs rejected the MEA statement. Swaraj’s somewhat melodramatic statement to the Indian Parliament hasn’t helped either and a gesture that could have improved the situation has ended up generating another spat.
But specifics aside, here’s the corollary: How this will unfold hereon will depend on how matters are worked out away from the media’s gaze. If there’s enough give, there will be a take. If not, well, pass me on that toast.
#India, #Pakistan national security advisors met in #Bangkok a day after #Christmas #Jadhav family meeting in #Islamabad
http://indianexpress.com/article/india/india-pak-nsas-met-in-bangkok-a-day-after-christmas-kulbhushan-jadhav-security-adviser-5005508/
Sources told The Sunday Express that the December 26 meeting between Ajit Doval and his Pakistani counterpart Lt General Nasir Khan Janjua (retd) took place at a ‘neutral venue’ in the Thai capital.
A day after the mother and wife of retired Naval officer Kulbhushan Jadhav met him in Islamabad in exceptional and controversial circumstances, the National Security Advisors (NSAs) of India and Pakistan met for talks in Bangkok. Sources told The Sunday Express that the December 26 meeting between Ajit Doval and his Pakistani counterpart Lt General Nasir Khan Janjua (retd) took place at a ‘neutral venue’ in the Thai capital.
The venue and date of the meeting were not linked to Pakistan’s treatment of Jadhav’s wife and mother. It had been decided between the two sides earlier this month, and it was, as sources described it, a “pre-scheduled meeting”.
Official Indian sources refused to comment on the subject.
Besides the offices of the NSA, sources indicated that the top hierarchy of the foreign ministries of the two countries was also in the loop about the meeting. As Pakistan’s NSA is a retired Lt General, Rawalpindi-based General Headquarters (GHQ) of the Pakistan Army was also kept informed of Tuesday’s meeting between the two NSAs.
On Thursday, Janjua met former Pakistan prime minister Nawaz Sharif at Sharif’s Jati Umra residence in Raiwind. As per Pakistan media reports, the meeting, which reportedly lasted five hours, included discussions on matters of national security, relations with Pakistan’s neighbouring countries and terrorism.
Dawn newspaper cited a PML-N leader quoting Sharif as saying at the meeting that “There is a dire need to improve ties with the neighbouring countries.” It also added that the former prime minister said he always talked about friendly relations with Pakistan’s neighbours because, without them, problems being faced by the people of the region could not be solved. “War is no solution to any problem,” he said.
The Bangkok meeting came in the wake of a sharp statement by the Pakistani NSA on India-Pakistan relations. On December 18, addressing a national security seminar in Islamabad, Janjua said, “The stability of the South Asian region hangs in a delicate balance, and the possibility of nuclear war cannot be ruled out.” He also stated that special efforts are needed to maintain balance in South Asia, which is “a mistake away” from a major catastrophe.
It was not the first meeting between the two NSAs in a third country. In December 2015, the two NSAs, along with the two foreign secretaries, had met, again in Bangkok, which was not revealed till after the meeting. That was followed, within days, by Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s surprise stop-over in Lahore, to wish then-Pakistan PM Nawaz Sharif on his birthday on December 25.
Meetings in third countries afford the two officials some space, away from the limelight, which the continual gaze of media on both sides of the border entails. It also gets around the tricky issue of the Pakistan NSA meeting leaders of Kashmir’s Hurriyat Conference, something which had led to cancellation of his visit to New Delhi in August 2015.
Tuesday’s meeting in Bangkok, which is believed to have lasted more than two hours, was kept under wraps, but it is believed that the Indian NSA raised the issue of infiltration of militants into Kashmir from across the Line of Control (LoC) with active support from the Pakistan army. The LoC has been very active this year, with more than 820 ceasefire violations recorded so far. This has included use of indirect firing weapons and cross-LoC raids by Border Action Teams. The Indian Army has lost 31 soldiers on the LoC in 2017.
Two ex chiefs of #India’s #spy agency #RAW did not want #KulbhushanJadhav recruited for covert ops in #Pakistan
https://www.thequint.com/news/politics/two-former-raw-chiefs-did-not-want-kulbhushan-jadhav-recruited-as-spy
Even as the controversy – tamasha, as it’s called in certain intelligence quarters – over Indian ‘spy’ Kulbhushan Jadhav refuses to die down, it has come to light that two former chiefs of the Research and Analysis Wing (RAW), who headed the organisation sometime over the past 15 years, had put their foot down against recruiting him for operations in Pakistan.
Speaking to The Quint, two former RAW senior officers, including one secretary who headed India’s external intelligence agency after 2008, said that the “proposal to recruit Jadhav for operations, whatever it’s worth, was ridiculous.”
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This was among a few different attempts to launch renewed efforts to use human sources as “deep penetration” agents in Pakistan, where most intelligence assets, both HUMINT and SIGINT, were wound up during the prime ministership of IK Gujral in the late 1990s.
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In any case, the recruitment was approved by a joint secretary as the supervisory officer. The RAW has a special unit which also undertakes parallel operations in certain crucial target countries for which it seeks out its own recruits.
The clearest evidence that Jadhav operated for the RAW came to the fore only after his cover – as a businessman who would frequent Iran, especially Chabahar – was blown and he was captured by the Pakistan, following which a former RAW chief, besides at least two other senior officers, called his Mumbai-based parents to “advise” them to not speak about their son’s case to anyone.
The other evidence was the second passport, with the name Hussein Mubarak Patel, that he carried, which shows that it was originally issued in 2003 and was renewed in 2014. The second passport (no L9630722) was issued in Thane on 12 May 2014 and was due to expire on 11 May 2024.
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The RAW sources, both former and serving, said that Jadhav would “go on assignments off and on” and he would undergo the mandatory “debriefing” each time he returned to India from his “visits to Balochistan” or when he volunteered to share information. He also went through a three-month training programme when he learned methods and means to transmit and/or send information.
However, sources said, Jadhav’s undoing was based partly on his unprofessionalism and partly because he was not a “career spy.” He did the unthinkable – instead of waiting to communicate with his case officer face-to-face, Jadhav would sometimes use “means over the air waves.” The ISI intercepted some of the communications and were also able to pinpoint his location, making it relatively easy for them to track and then nab him, sources said.
“The botch-up was the result of unprofessionalism not only on the part of Jadhav but also his case officer,” one former special secretary, who conducted operations in some parts of West Asia, said. In this context, a former special secretary who handled the Pakistan desk till a few years ago, besides special operations in India’s neighbourhood, said that “Jadhav was no good” as he was “never in the thick of things, although he would claim he knew a lot of things and had sources in Pakistan.”
However, the former special secretary said that while RAW has many flaws, as a “matter of rule and unstated policy” no case officer should attempt to hire the services of an agent whose background in “tradecraft is not sound enough” and who is given to “bragging.”
In Jadhav’s case, while standard operating procedures may have been relaxed while recruiting him, sources said that his incarceration and the ambiguity surrounding his “work” does “have a lot of benefits.”
Two ex chiefs of #India’s #spy agency #RAW did not want #KulbhushanJadhav recruited for covert ops in #Pakistan
https://www.thequint.com/news/politics/two-former-raw-chiefs-did-not-want-kulbhushan-jadhav-recruited-as-spy
“The botch-up was the result of unprofessionalism not only on the part of Jadhav but also his case officer,” one former special secretary, who conducted operations in some parts of West Asia, said. In this context, a former special secretary who handled the Pakistan desk till a few years ago, besides special operations in India’s neighbourhood, said that “Jadhav was no good” as he was “never in the thick of things, although he would claim he knew a lot of things and had sources in Pakistan.”
However, the former special secretary said that while RAW has many flaws, as a “matter of rule and unstated policy” no case officer should attempt to hire the services of an agent whose background in “tradecraft is not sound enough” and who is given to “bragging.”
In Jadhav’s case, while standard operating procedures may have been relaxed while recruiting him, sources said that his incarceration and the ambiguity surrounding his “work” does “have a lot of benefits.”
Several seasoned RAW hands said that while Jadhav’s case officer (deputy secretary) and the latter’s supervisory officer (joint secretary) recruited him for “reasons best known to them,” the standard practice in spycraft would have been to “have a Baloch or a Pakistani national” do the “intelligence gathering job for us.” He added that it was “foolish for to set an Indian the task to obtain intelligence from a country as hostile as Pakistan.”
Sources said that soon after Jadhav was trapped and caught in March 2016, a few records relating to payments made to him were destroyed, leaving “no trace” of his existence as far the RAW is concerned. But a former agency chief, who retired in the closing years of the previous decade, said, “No professional agency should have recruited him. I cannot even imagine that Jadhav was because it has been a disaster.”
He asked pointedly: “Every operation should have an objective. What huge intelligence or foreign policy objective was to be achieved by tasking Jadhav to operate in Balochitan?”
What the Kulbhushan Jadhav Saga Reveals About India and Pakistan’s Balochistan Problems
India’s Quint published and deleted a story alleging that Jadhav was indeed spying for India. What does that tell us?
https://thediplomat.com/2018/01/what-the-kulbhushan-jadhav-saga-reveals-about-india-and-pakistans-balochistan-problems/
This weekend, a report in India surfaced that confirmed Kulbhushan Jadhav was an asset of Indian intelligence. Jadhav, a former Indian naval officer, is currently on death row in Pakistan for spying, having been captured in Balochistan in early 2016. Until now, New Delhi has publicly denied that Jadhav had any relationship with the Indian state since his retirement from the navy. To the contrary, New Delhi alleged that Jadhav was a legitimate businessman kidnapped from Iran by Pakistan’s intelligence services.
The “legitimate businessman” façade has slowly been chipped away over 18 months. Leaving aside major complications in India’s story, such as Iran’s silence in the face of this ostensibly daring violation of its sovereignty, even reporters closely tied to India’s security establishment revealed that Jadhav offered to spy for Indian intelligence “several times” between 2010 and 2012, only to be rebuffed. What was new about this weekend’s report, however, was that for the first time, an Indian outlet essentially confirmed Pakistan’s version of events. In the report, both serving and retired Research and Analysis Wing (RAW) officers claimed that Jadhav was indeed spying for India in Balochistan.
The reaction was swift. Minutes after being published, the article was vociferously denounced by Indian journalists and analysts on social media, and in the comments section by readers, as being irresponsible and treacherous. Hours later, the article was taken down entirely. Though an archived version of the article still exists, there is otherwise no trace of it ever being written. The author and editor in question have not publicly explained why or how the article was published or taken down. There has been no follow up to the article’s startling admission by major newspapers or television channels.
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South Asia is no stranger to the phenomenon of external actors intervening in their neighbors’ domestic conflicts. Most famously in 1971, during Pakistan’s civil war, India corralled, trained, and supplied the Mukti Bahini, which became strong enough to be one of the very few rebel groups to win a secessionist war and change an international border. Pakistan, for its part, has repeatedly sought to spark or fuel rebellion in Kashmir, most prominently in the early 1990s, as well as other secessionist hotspots, such as Punjab in the 1980s or the Indian northeast in the 1960s. Bangladesh and Myanmar have hosted militants targeting India’s northeast. India has returned the favor with each, and supported Tamil militants taking on the Sri Lankan state in the 1980s too.
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Unlike India, the country most beset by secessionism, Pakistan does not have manifold separatist movements threatening its territorial integrity today. With the loss of East Pakistan in 1971, and the dampening of Sindhi and Pashtun nationalism in the last four decades, Pakistan finds itself much closer to Sri Lanka than its eastern neighbor: facing one, and only one, major separatist movement.
#India’s secret war against #Pakistan. by Praveen Swami #KulbhushanJadhav #Balochistan #RAW #ajitdoval
http://www.frontline.in/the-nation/indias-secret-war/article10055129.ece
he implications of the questions raised by the Kulbhushan Jadhav case go far beyond Jadhav’s fate. It is time India reflects seriously on its expanding programme of covert action and its long-term consequences. By PRAVEEN SWAMI
FOR six hours, the hired car had driven through a forest of shadows, cast by the mountains of Iran’s Sistan-Baluchistan province—for generations, a refuge for smugglers, insurgents and spies. Heading towards Saravan, a town of 50,000 some 20 kilometres from the border with Pakistan, the car was carrying a businessman from Mumbai to a meeting. The men he wanted to meet were waiting, but there were others, too: like every spy story, this one ended in betrayal.
India knows something of what happened next: Kulbhushan Jadhav is now on death row, awaiting execution, after a hurried trial by a military court in Pakistan which found him guilty of espionage.
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Ever since 2013, India has secretly built up a covert action programme against Pakistan, seeking to retaliate against jehadists and deter their sponsors in the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) Directorate. Led by National Security Adviser Ajit Doval, and now by Research and Analysis Wing’s (RAW) Anil Dhasmana, the programme has registered unprecedented success, hitting hard against organisations such as the Lashkar-e-Taiba and the Jaish-e-Muhammad. But the story of the man on death row illustrates that this secret war is not risk-free. Lapses in tradecraft and judgment, inevitable parts of any human enterprise, can inflict harm far greater than the good they seek to secure.
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the Kulbhushan Jadhav case ought to raise questions about whether India’s intelligence bosses are devoting the kind of granular attention that the issue requires to insulate the country from the potential risks. The questions over Jadhav’s passports, the opacity of his business operations and, most important, the lack of transparency about his connection to the Indian Navy, have all made it difficult for the government of India to dissociate itself from his cause—the usual, necessary fate of the spy. It is also not clear why, if he is indeed a spy, he was not withdrawn after Uzair Baluch’s arrest, an elementary precaution.
Perhaps more importantly, there ought to be a serious political debate cutting across party lines on the possible consequences of covert action.
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Precedents do exist to resolve situations like this. Gary Powers, the pilot of a CIA espionage flight shot down over the Soviet Union in May 1960—and reviled by his colleagues for not committing suicide—was eventually exchanged for the legendary KGB spy Vilyam Genrikhovich Fisher.
In both New Delhi and Islamabad, there are rumours the two capitals are working on just such a deal—possibly involving former ISI officer Lieutenant Colonel Mohammad Zahir Habib, alleged to have been kidnapped by India—or a wider deal, which could see the release of multiple espionage convicts.
Both countries have much to gain from a dispassionate conversation on the case—on the norms that ought to govern covert activity of the one against the other, and on the inexorable consequences of the secret war Pakistan has long run.
For that, the Kulbhushan Jadhav case needs to be elevated above prime-time ranting and opened up for rational discussion.
How #KulbushanJadhav led #India’s covert war in #Pakistan: Jadhav and #PPP affiliated #Karachi gangster Uzair Baloch developed a pivotal relationship 2014 onwards. Uzair's #Iranian passport enable him to freely move in and out of #Chahabar.
https://tribune.com.pk/story/1624582/1-kulbushan-jadhav-led-indias-covert-war-pakistan/
Indian magazine Frontline, a publication of renowned newspaper The Hindu has revealed detailed accounts of India’s secret war inside Pakistan involving terrorist Kulbushan Jadhav, National Security Advisor (NSA), Ajit Kumar Doval and chiefs of the Research & Analysis Wing (RAW).
How it all started
Kulbushan Sudhir Jadhav bearing service number 41558Z was inducted into the Indian Navy in 1987, according to The Gazette of India which records promotions, commissioning and retirement of military officials.
Two Indian navy officials relay that Jadhav’s transition into the notorious spy world began after the parliament house attack in 2001 when the Indian navy was setting up nine naval detachments to monitor the Maharashtra and Gujarat coasts but they lacked an independent intelligence capacity to monitor threats from across the sea.
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In 2006, the Balochistan insurgency exploded and the Indian intelligence community pressured their stations in Afghanistan to develop more contacts in the region.
“Our new asset in Chabahar soon began to be drawn into counterterrorism work for the Intelligence Bureau – raising fears that the fact that he was still on the organisation’s payroll could lead to embarrassment,” stated Indian Naval Intelligence officials.
According to sources, the Indian Navy Chief, Admiral Arun Prakash’s resistance to these efforts was overruled by the Indian Intelligence bosses because they were desperate for assets.
“The Navy was extremely worried about the possible consequences of the tasks being assigned to Jadhav by the Intelligence Bureau. However, we were basically told that since he was there, that was how it needed to be,” said one officer.
“The push to draw Jadhav into front-line intelligence work was driven by the IB’s ambitions to have an independent overseas role. RAW’s own intelligence capacities in the region, they argued, were more than adequate to address emerging threats,” stated former RAW officials.
Sources said that Jadhav gave an idea about a reprisal attack on Karachi in case another 26/11 attack takes place which grasped the attention of top Indian intelligence officials.
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Relationship with Uzair Baloch
Sources confirmed that Jadhav and Uzair Baloch, a Karachi-based ganglord developed a pivotal relationship 2014 onwards. Due to the latter’s Iranian passport, he was able to freely move in and out of Chahabar.
Jadhav’s next door neighbour was Jaleel Baloch who happened to be Uzair Baloch’s nephew. He used to take cash from Jadhav in return for useful information.
Pakistan military sources insist that Jadhav made at least five deliveries of a huge cache of weapons to terrorists supporting the Baloch liberation movement.
“Baloch was involved in espionage activities, by providing secret information/sketches regarding Army installations and officials to foreign agents,” reiterates an official Pakistani investigation document. However, the material he handed over appeared to be low grade.
Last year Uzair Baloch was arrested in Abu Dhabi by the Interpol and handed over to Pakistani authorities.
“Baloch’s interrogation, eventually led the ISI to the Indian whose operations in Chahbahar had gone undetected for over a decade,” Pakistani official sources confirmed.
Subsequently, in April 2017, Baloch admitted in his testimony that he was in touch with terrorist Kulbushan Jadhav and Iranian intelligence.
#Balochistan Separatist Leader Jumma Marri Says in #Moscow He Now Supports #Pakistan and Blames #India for Hijacking Struggle: #CPEC #China #Russia #Afghanistan https://sputniknews.com/interviews/201802231061939477-balochistan-korybko-jumma-marri-baloch/ … via @SputnikInt
Dr. Jumma Marri Baloch, a prominent leader of the Baloch independence movement and designer of the separatist flag, recently renounced his decades-long campaign against Pakistan while attending a Pakistani Unity Day event last weekend in Moscow, where Sputnik’s Andrew Korybko had the chance to conduct a brief interview with him.
Sputnik: Tell us little about yourself: how and why did you come to Russia, how long have you been here and what do you do presently?
Jumma Marri Baloch: I think everybody who was interested about the Baloch affairs might know my struggle to free Balochistan, which is not hidden from anyone. I will not be wrong if I say that I am from those people who were always on the forefront of the Baloch freedom struggle — many of the readers might know the fact that the Free Balochistan flag, which is currently very popular and is in use, was designed by me.
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For the sake of Free Balochistan I left my home, Pakistan, province, tribe and even my father and brothers. In 1979, due to the Balochistan movement I, along with my family, left for Afghanistan and settled there. Since 2000 I am in self-exile in Moscow.
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Sputnik: Who is behind the so-called "Free Balochistan" Campaign, what are they aiming for, and how do they operate?
Jumma Marri Baloch: There are no doubts that India is squarely behind the unrest in Balochistan. I am a witness to it from within: India tries to counter Pakistan's support for Kashmir and India wants to pay Pakistan in the same coin by supporting a few so-called Baloch leaders who are enjoying very luxurious lifestyles in such expensive cities as Geneva and London. These people are sending some money to create unrest in Balochistan like blowing electricity supplies, mining bridges and putting mines in the roadside to keep the money supplies open from Delhi.
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Sputnik: What is the reason why some international media have been repeating the claims of Baloch separatists and sometimes even lobbying on their behalf, and how does this relate to global fake news industry?
Jumma Marri Baloch: No international media pays any attention to these Baloch separatists except Indian media that are working closely with the Indian intelligence who are paid to cover their paid agents working as Baloch freedom fighters. These are all Indian attempts to silence the voices of the Kashmir struggle for freedom. I guarantee if Pakistan gives even the slightest hint to the Indians that they will stop supporting the Kashmiri, the Hindus will dump the Baloch next day down in a sewage canal.
Sputnik: What is the most effective way to debunk these falsehoods and show people the truth about Balochistan and its native people's relationship to the rest of Pakistan?
Jumma Marri Baloch: Develop the awareness of people about the negative propaganda, through education and empowering the local people to run their affairs without intervention. The Baloch must be respected, first of all, on their own soil, then such negative propaganda will have no effects. The majority of the Baloch people have no problem with Pakistan, but they have questions to the government as every normal citizen of any country around the world.
#India’s #RAW recruited 3 warlords in #Afghanistan, including Ahmad Shah Masood, says 'RAW: A History of India’s Covert Operations' by investigative journalist Yatish Yadav. He doesn’t disclose the names of 2 other warlords still in #Afghan politics
https://www.deccanherald.com/national/raw-had-recruited-three-warlords-in-afghanistan-says-book-868599.html
At least three RAW spies involved in covert action in Afghanistan have claimed that Afghan armed forces were "demoralised and divided, remained practically inactive" during the Soviet army’s December 1979 invasion, the book, which will be released on Monday said.
The book also claims that the US knew about the Indian activities in Afghanistan and the Americans launched propaganda against the RAW with stories appearing with Washington dateline, which said that the US supply of arms was a "sort of punishment" to India for failing to oppose the Soviet Union on Afghan soil and the Soviet-Vietnam interference in Cambodia.
RAW also feared, the book said, that the Taliban would not waste time in killing former President of Afghanistan Mohammad Najibullah Ahmadzai once they gained dominance in the war. An Indian spy recalled the message the RAW sent to Najibullah,
who was staying at the UN mission in Kabul, to leave the country but he refused outrightly. Another effort was made through a reluctant Massoud, but Najibullah rejected the offer once again, arguing that the Taliban may not attack him.
Why India must restructure RAW, recruit agents from different backgrounds
Like the US, India should have a wall of honour for agents who sacrifice their lives to ensure there is no war with Pakistan, writes Jay Desai.
https://theprint.in/yourturn/subscriberwrites-why-india-must-restructure-raw-recruit-agents-from-different-backgrounds/702161/
So now it is high time that the RAW starts recruiting people from different educational backgrounds. This will increase efficiency in a great manner which is badly needed. Another problem is that RAW has no website of its own. For example, the CIA has its own website. The CIA website includes the literature relevant to a scholar. On the CIA’s website, one book is notable, called ‘The Book of Honor: The Secret Lives and Deaths of CIA Operatives’. It is a book by the journalist Ted Gup.
The book basically talks about these CIA operatives who died in action while defending the interests of the USA. In CIA headquarters at Virginia, there exists a wall of honour, a marble wall with black stars engraved, where each represents a fallen CIA agent and in a bullet proof glass case is kept ‘the book of honor’.
The book does consist of a list for each year. It is the year on which a CIA officer fell, where more than 50% cases of anonymous stars are present to conceal identity. There was an Indian national, Ravindra Kaushik, RAW agent in Pakistan, who penetrated the Pakistani Army and became a Major, during years of service to the nation; he saved the lives of 20,000 Indian soldiers. In 1983, he was caught and subsequently incarcerated. He died at a Pakistani jail in November 2001.
Why should not there be something in India similar to a wall of honour for such people who became martyrs? After all, these individuals make the supreme sacrifice acting as India’s first line of defence to ensure no war takes place between India and Pakistan. True, Kaushik was only a source and not an employee of the RAW. But that should not be the criteria by indicating that we will never acknowledge fallen sources like him (including many sources similar to Kaushik). Arthashastra does recommend that a spy should be rewarded for his or her service to the nation.
RAW has increased India’s influence across the world. The birth of Bangladesh from East Pakistan, growing influence inside Afghanistan, adding Sikkim in 1975 to the Indian State, security of the Indian programme on nuclear weapons, success of African liberation movement have all been the big success stories of RAW. On 22 October 2020, the RAW chief made a visit to Nepal. He arrived on a special aircraft of the Indian Air Force and met then-PM K.P. Sharma Oli as well as the avowed opposition Communist leader, former PM Baburam Bhattarai.
In India’s strategic imagination, Nepal is very important. Nepal, with the high Himalayas between India and China, is critical for India to get right as part of the neighborhood. India-Nepal relations are through open borders and from a security perspective it should never be forgotten that the Pakistanis used Kathmandu to hijack the Indian commercial flight IC814. So this plane ultimately landed in Kandahar, Afghanistan; Government’s hard time.
So a stable, peaceful Nepal is vital which is not vulnerable to external forces that are inimical to Indian interest, for example China. If Nepal is unstable, its institutions are weak, then it has every possibility of becoming a fertile ground for external forces.
The authors (Adrian Levy and Cathy Scott-Clark of Spy Stories) also conclude that Kulbhushan Jadhav, the former Naval commander accused of planning terror attacks and awaiting an appeal on a death sentence in Pakistan, was an “asset” but not an “officer” for the Indian intelligence agencies, who had been “trapped” by Pakistan’s ISI. India has flatly denied those charges, and said that Mr. Jadhav retired from service in 2001 and was kidnapped by Pakistani agencies in Iran. However, the book says many Indian intelligence agencies had shown interest in recruiting Mr. Jadhav due to his access from Iran to Pakistan, and that he was lured by the ISI to Karachi to meet a Baloch contact.
https://www.thehindu.com/news/national/two-foreign-journalists-had-post-pulwama-back-channel-role-between-india-pakistan-says-book/article35861441.ece
“According to some of those we interviewed in IB (Intelligence Bureau), R&AW and Indian Navy as well as ISI and military intelligence in Pakistan, many agencies were suddenly interested in a man like [Jadhav] who had the wherewithal to travel with cover….There was already plenty of R&AW investment in terms of assets and officers in Iranian Baluchistan and at Chabahar, but to have Jadhav, who could travel widely, and even to get down to Karachi, would make him exceptional,” Mr. Levy said in an interview. “Not as an officer, trained, deployed and backed up by an institution — but as an asset, we were told, a person who reported back to handlers and supervisors, with [his] insights,” he added.
Dear Sir Riaz
Thank you for your post, Sir is it true that the case of Indian spy Kulbushan Yadav was taken to ICJ(International Court of Justice)?
Sir do you really think ICJ(International Court of Justice) will do justice with this case?
Regards,
#Indian #intelligence #RAW agent, who spied on #Pakistan, lives a miserable life in #India. Daniel served a 4-year sentence in Pakistan. He was promised money & government job. Now he drives a rickshaw while his wife works as a maid washing dishes. https://tribune.com.pk/story/2321560/raw-agent-who-spied-on-pakistan-lives-a-miserable-life-in-india
About the tasks assigned to him, he said he was asked to gather information about the location of various army units, their movement and said at times he was tasked to make friendly contacts with Pakistani working or retired military personnel and try to get any type of information.
Daniel said he and his other fellow agents also used to lure some Pakistanis to work for RAW and in those days since only the Indian side was fenced they faced no problem in smuggling people, as the Indian Border Security Force (BSF) always facilitated them.
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Indian agents working for the notorious Research and Analysis Wing (RAW) feel dejected and abandoned by their parent spy agency, forcing them to live the rest of their lives in squalid conditions.
For people like Daniel, who served a four-year sentence in Pakistan, life has become miserable as now he has to drive a rickshaw while his wife works as a maid washing dishes, to earn some livelihood, an Indian news channel Pro Punjab said.
In an interview, Daniel, a Christian, who lives in an Indian Punjab village bordering Sialkot and Narowal area, claimed that he worked for his country’s spy agency RAW, on lucrative promises of money and a government job, and was smuggled into Pakistan in 1992 to carry out the dirty work.
“We used to feel very proud while working for RAW,” he said to a question, however, felt disheartened that his agency had abandoned him.
Daniel said he travelled back and forth across the border 10 times in a year, till he got caught in 1993 in Lahore. When questioned about his arrest, he said he did not utter a single word about being tasked by RAW to gather information from Pakistan, during the tough interrogation.
He said they were told to pose as smugglers or act like someone who crossed over to the other side by mistake. He said he was shifted from various jails and eventually released from Kot Lakhpat jail Lahore.
The former spy went on to say that in one of his earlier ventures into Pakistan, he barely escaped arrest and hid under a culvert as a Rangers team patrolled the area. ”We hid there for over an hour till it was clear to move in the dark.”
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