KOLKATA: High alert was sounded across West Bengal on Saturday after the terror attack in Dhaka and a Hindu priest was hacked to death on Friday and another priest attacked with sharp weapons on Saturday in Bangladesh.
The Ministry of Home Affairs sent a memo to the Chief Secretary and Home Secretary detailing reports of possible terror attacks in the State. The Intelligence Bureau as well as the NIA alerted the West Bengal government of possible attacks by Islamic terror groups like Jamaat-ul-Mujahideen Bangladesh (JuMB) and Ansarullah Bangla Team.
After the explosion on October 2, 2014, at Khagragarh in Burdwan district, in which JUMB terrorists were involved, the NIA had arrested several members of the group from the State and found its link with Pakistan’s spy agency ISI. The NIA last year also arrested many ISI agents from Kolkata and recovered from them maps of Indian Army’s eastern command and Garden Reach Shipbuilders and Engineers Limited where Indian Navy’s war ships are built.
The arrest of five ISI agents in Hyderabad on Wednesday by the NIA led to their connections in Kolkata, from where Bangladesh border town Saatkhira, one of the JuMB strongholds in the neighbouring country, is only an hour’s drive away.
The BSF sealed the 2,300 km-long porous border with Bangladesh and intensified patrolling using speed boats in the riverine areas. The BSF conducted search operations in all the villages in the border districts along with the police. Senior BSF officials held a series of meetings with the district police chiefs to initiate measures to prevent infiltration by Islamic terrorists who are now on the run in Bangladesh thanks to the crack down by the Rapid Action Battalion there. The BSF also stepped up vigil on all entry points on the border.
On Friday, 50-year-old priest Shyamananda Das of Radhamadan Gopal Mutt of Madhupur in Jhenaidaha district of Bangladesh was hacked to death. On Saturday morning, another Hindu priest of Radha Gobindo temple at Brahmarajpur in Saatkhira district was attacked. Panic prevailed among Hindus, Buddhists and Christian communities in the neighbouring country as several had been killed during the last five months.
West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee on Saturday directed the state administration and police to ensure communal harmony in the State. The Kolkata Police carried out searches in hotels in central part of the city where large number of Bangladeshis stay and also asked five-star hotels to beef up security. Special force personnel in plainclothes were deployed at the age-old Writers’ Building, Calcutta Stock Exchange, Victoria Memorial and all the consulates of the Western countries. Security at the Netaji Subhash Chandra Bose International Airport and Kolkata and Haldia ports were tightened.