India's frequent accusations have found confirmation with revelations being made in Dhaka by Abdur Rauf Daud Merchant, the convicted assassin of Mumbai cinema's T-Series music baron Gulshan Kumar, about the subversive role of international mafia don Dawood Ibrahim Kaskar. Dawood Ibrahim runs a network of at least 150 agents in Bangladesh. Some 20 of them are women whose job is to lure people into the underworld network and to please the

political bosses in Bangladesh who patronize the network. Dhaka Police says this is only the tip of the iceberg. More documents and recorded memories of Merchant's cell phone are yielding more and more information.Ibrahim's second-in-command Chhota Shakeel sends large sums of money regularly to pay the agents. India has been saying that Ibrahim, operating from Karachi and Dubai, has a widespread network of agents across South Asia carrying on activities against India. These have been denied by governments in the neighbourhood. Now Merchant tells it all after he was nabbed accidentally while in hiding in a village in Brahmanbaria district in eastern Bangladesh, close to the Tripura border. What Dhaka does not say but sources in New Delhi claim is that Dhaka acted on a tip-off from India. Merchant, said to be 37 or 39, was preparing to fly out to Dubai when he was caught.

convicted. Merchant availed a two week furlough to meet his mother, wife and two children. But he disappeared and has now been caught in Bangladesh.

Once caught, Merchant has begun to sing like a canary, Bangladesh Police Detective Department says. He talks of working at the behest of and on the pay-roll of Chhota Shakil. He claims never to have met Dawood Ibrahim. He makes many claims. He says he did not kill Gulshan Kumar. One Anil Tyagi carried out the killing. If he had any contact with this socalled Tyagi, he is not saying.

Merchant has told the Bangladesh Police of Chhota Shakeels plans to kill Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi and top BJP leaders including L K Advani after the Godhra riots in Gujarat in 2002. Merchant claims that he is in Bangladesh only to hide. But Bangladesh Police does not believe him. They are probing if he went into hiding as part of a 'mission'. They are looking for Merchant's possible connection with an ongoing case of illegal shipping of huge quantities of arms and ammunition. 

Now, this is a story within the story - in fact, a larger one. Tragically, people in India, especially in the north, are unaware and are least interested. Ever since East Pakistan came into being after the Partition, it sheltered anti-India elements - the Nagas, the Mizos, Kamtapuris, Bodos, Manipuris -- whoever is fighting New Delhi. For most part since 1975, this has continued whenever anti-India governments rule Bangladesh.

One of the most prominent groups operating from Bangladesh soil - which Dhaka officially denies - is the United Liberation Front of Asom (Ulfa). Its top man, Paresh Baruah lives in Dhaka, has good investments in business with the help of money extorted in Assam, has marred locally and has a teenage son. He goes by the name of Zaman. Ulfa's military wing chief Anup Chetia was caught under Indian government's pressure and jailed for entering Bangladesh on a fake passport. He completed his fouryear jail term. But he remains there as Dhaka will not hand him over to India because there is no extradition treaty between the two neighbours.

Now, Ulfa runs its military operations with the help of arms got through Bangladesh, something Dhaka denies. But accidental catching of one consignment has busted this ongoing operation. In April 2004, two police sergeants on night duty located a consignment and grew suspicious.

They were found to be arms and ammunition. One the matter went on record, it could not be hidden. It became a police case and a court matter. Ten truck loads of arms of ammunition were actually brought from China on a ship belonging to a company owned by Salahuddin Qader Choudhury, a known pro- Pakistan politician and MP who is close to Begum Khaleda Zia, who then ruled Bangladesh. Because of her government's pressures, the case was suppressed. The two sergeants and lower level functionaries were sacked and jailed. The case was revived after Khaleda Zia was no longer the PM and, thanks to the Hasina government, is being probed on a daily basis. In early May this year, police arrested two retired generals of the Bangladesh army. Both were key officials of the national Security Intelligence (NSI) and Directorate General of Field Intelligence (DGFI) - organizations set up and nurtured during the Pakistan era and are said to be still working in conjunction with Pakistan's ISI. Major General (rtd) Rezaqul Hyder Choudhury was forced to retire last year when his role in the arms haul case became known. Also sacked was Brigadier General Abdur Rahim. A third top operative is Sahabuddin Ahmed, a Bangladesh Air Force Wing Commander on deputation to the NSI.

This is an ongoing investigation and now a matter of court proceedings. But general Indian public is either unaware or not interested.

It is likely that Merchant will make news, not because of his possible link to Ulfa and the arms haul, but because of his role in killing a personality of Mumbai cinema. This underlines the superficial approach to serious matters by all concerned Indians - the government, the general public and the media.