AMRITSAR: The Army authorities have taken a serious view of a militant attack on an Army convoy in the district in which four officers were injured. Senior Army officers are worried and are of the view that the attack is a pointer that militants may strike against Army personnel in a big way.
In the incident, a convoy of the 14 Bihar Regiment on its way to Harike from Patti was ambushed near Chuslewad village. Three men were killed when the Army Jawans returned the fire. A Lieutenant, a JCO and two jawans were wounded in the exchange of fire.
This was the fifth attack on Army men in border districts in the past one year.
Reliable sources said that following the ambush, Army men has been directed to be on full alert while moving in the border areas and security of the convoys was being strengthened.
Intelligence agencies had definite information that militants been “instructed” by the Inter-services Intelligence (ISI) of Pakistan to step up attacks on Army personnel.
According to Indian Propaganda, to forge “a coordinated insurgency” in the Kashmir valley and Punjab, the ISI was said to have given fresh guidelines to groups in the two states.
The propaganda said that Pakistani agencies had been consistently trying to raise a “fifth column” in the country.
The recent attacks on members of the armed forces were also aimed at provoking the latter to intensively comb villages.
Some intelligence reports had also said that certain groups had succeeded in smuggling Army uniforms from Pakistan, the sources said. Police picked up the body of a youth near Valtoha in Tarn Taran district.
Reports said six men went to the house of Master Jamna Singh of Hargana village in Ludhiana district and asked him to open the door. On his refusal, they fired from Ak47s. Jamna Singh returned the fire injuring one of them. Militants took away weapons of four security men on duty at tower number seven, in Ropar district. The miscreants took away two rifles and SO cartridges of the Jawans.
Meanwhile, in a statement home minister Mufti Mohammed Sayeed decried the recent pronouncements about the right to self-determination for Sikhs by some individuals claiming to be leaders of Punjab.
Apparently the motivation for such irresponsible statements comes from committees and agencies operating from Pakistan and those who do not have the interest of the country and Punjab at heart”, the home minister told the members of the consultative committee attached to his ministry.
He said the talks of self-determination and election under the auspices of United Nations were completely out of place in the constitutional set up of the country and manifestly ant national.
Five persons, including two Jawans, were killed in Punjab while security forces repulsed Two major attacks by militants on CRPF posts.
Security forces also arrested 4 militants after encounters and seized some arms and ammunition from them.
An Amritsar report said militants mounted rocket attacks at two places in the district. There were no reports of any casualties in the encounters. In another incident militants gunned down two police personnel head constable Surinder Singh and Spo Prem Singh in village Gore Nangal under Ramdas police station area of the district.
An unidentified man was killed in an encounter with security forces near village Kohara in Ferozepur district on Sunday night.
Article extracted from this publication >> September 14, 1990
