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BSF to add muscle to STF's
Nab Veerappan campaign

M D Riti in Bangalore

Karnataka asked for the National Security Guards to help hunt down Veerappan, but had to settle for the Border Security Force instead.

Almost 1000 BSF personnel, currently posted in Tripura, Assam, Manipur and West Bengal, are expected to arrive in Karnataka and Tamil Nadu, to strengthen the Special Task Force assembled to nab sandalwood smuggler Veerappan.

The battalion also comprises a commando force known as the Quick Reaction Team, consisting of 40 men.

The person who will lead the action against Veerappan in Karnataka will be H T Sangliana. Assisting him is Shankar Bidri, who led the STF in Karnataka the last time the BSF was pressed into action against Veerappan.

Dr Harsh Vardhan Raju continues to be the man actually on the spot at M M Hills and Mysore, leading the STF. Sangliana will be overall in-charge of the operation.

Bidri, normally known to be articulate and accessible to the media, has clammed up ever since he was inducted back into the STF. "We have been asked not to talk to journalists about the STF's plan of action," he says firmly, with a polite smile on his round face.

Sangliana shuttles between M M Hills and Bangalore, and says the same thing.

However, the government's decision to deploy the BSF has its share of critics.

It is now six years since four companies of the BSF (about 400 men) spent a year in the jungle chasing Veerappan unsuccessfully. They did have several encounters with Veerappan and his men, and managed to bring down the size of the gang to about two dozen members.

Veerappan's brother Arjunan was among those who fell into the STF dragnet. He died mysteriously of cyanide poisoning in a police van while being taken to a Terrorist And Disruptive Activities (Prevention) Act court as a preliminary to being handed over back to the Tamil Nadu police.

Veerappan still holds Bidri and the BSF responsible for Arjunan's death.

Nedumaran, who was among those who helped secure the release of Kannada actor Dr Rajakumar from Veerappan's custody, had expressed his unhappiness over the move to bring back Bidri and the BSF.

It would antagonise Veerappan and the tribals in the area, he says. This is because Bidri and the BSF have been accused of committing all kinds of atrocities on tribals, he adds.

Intelligence gathering from sympathetic villagers is an important dimension of this kind of operation, Nedumaran pointed out.

"The accusations are false," an indignant Bidri told rediff.com. "Please look at my track record in the police force. It's absolutely clean. Why would I harass or authorise cruel treatment of villagers or tribals?"

Bidri himself has not ventured far into the jungle. He seems content to direct operations from Bangalore. His critics claim that he does not want to risk going into the jungles, knowing that he will be Veerappan's prime target.

Word is also out that all is not well in the newly formed STF.

Sangliana is an officer who is reported to be unpopular in the police force. He is also new to the M M Hills forest. Bidri, who has worked in that terrain for three years, might be loath to report to him.

Kempaiah, the third high profile officer who was drafted into the STF, reportedly had his own ideas on how the operation should be conducted. He suggested, for example, that he would like to take Nagappa, the man who escaped from Veerappan's clutches, back into the jungle to show the way to some of Veerappan's hideouts.

Kempaiah also has his own intelligence network in the region built up when he served as police commissioner of Mysore town for a couple of years.

When it became difficult for the state government to juggle three high profile officers like Sangliana, Bidri and Kempaiah, all known to have reasonably large egos, and Dr Harsh Vardhan Raju, who now heads the STF, and knit them into a homogenous team, Kempaiah was dropped.

Critics opposed to deployment of the BSF also point out that the force is trained to protect the country's borders, and not hunt out fugitives hiding in the jungles.

The arms they are trained to use are mostly used on distant targets. Are they the right choice for this type of operation, they ask?

What is needed here is networking with villagers, ferreting out information about Veerappan's whereabouts and movements, and surprise strikes, they say.

Replies Vijay Kumar, Inspector General of the BSF: "Local police will have to provide information about the movements of the gang. The BSF will only be the strike force and tactical muscle power."

Adds newly appointed BSF chief Gurbachan Jagat: "Whether the operation will be successful or not depends on what kind of hard intelligence the state police gives us."

He counters the criticism that the BSF is trained only to protect the national borders by pointing out that they have actually conducted many operations in the jungles in the North-east.

Meanwhile, open spaces in the forest area are being identified for constructing air strips for choppers. The Karnataka STF has reportedly asked the India Air Force for two helicopters to which the IAF has apparently agreed.

Sources in the STF say that they have submitted an area map containing six possible landing spots. These spots will be out of Veerappan's shooting range, but easily accessible for the STF personnel.

Apart from this, the police even considered aerial surveillance to locate Veerappan. However, Indian Space Research Organisation chairman Dr K Kasturirangan pointed out that their cameras simply did not have the kind of resolution to spot man movement, especially in dense jungle terrain.

This time around, if the Tamil Nadu and Karnataka governments fail to catch Veerappan, it will be something that neither would ever be able to live down.

COMPLETE COVERAGE
The saga of Veerappan
The Rajakumar Abduction

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