By Patricia Mukhim
Five policemen mowed down by Sohan Shira’s men should make us angry and outraged. Glib condemnations are passé. Those who have died cannot be brought back to life. And to hell with the post-death honour and praise! They too are mere rituals! Sohan’s liberation army seems to have swelled in ranks. Think 40 GNLA cadres pouncing on five policemen! It’s an unequal war!
Meghalaya Police have their hands full. There is the ongoing pro-ILP agitation and the night road blockades that require their constant vigil. It is easy to blame the police for a lot of stuff that we believe we know better to handle. But on November 5 while returning from Guwahati post midnight I saw the police performing their duties with rare commitment. Right from Byrnihat they provided escort to vehicles that needed to ply to and from Shillong. Policemen were seen patrolling the Shillong-Guwahati highway. At Barik Point I saw several policemen of the SWAT team, vigilant yet bonded by bonhomie. Other groups are posted at different points in the city. So while we were sleeping they kept watch! At 1 am they were very alert and on their toes.
But the point is that the rabidly anti-people, GNLA seems more intelligently organised and strategically poised to take on the security forces. Things are not looking too good for Meghalaya at this juncture. The chief minister’s repeated plea to the Union Home Ministry for additional forces have met with rebuff. And this is not surprising. Delhi only listens when blood and gore spills out on the streets; when bombs and guns rent the air. The loss of lives of five improperly armed and perhaps inadequately trained foot soldiers on 6th November is a reflection of bad police strategy. This is pathetic to say the least. Not that only the police have become targets of the GNLA. Even ordinary citizens have been killed after being labelled police informers.
Sometimes there is a tendency to undermine the strength of the enemy especially when they have been inflicted with temporary setbacks. The police raid on Sohan’s home was a feat, no doubt, but police should not have lowered their guard. The Government has been playing a cat and mouse game with Sohan Shira for a long time. Somehow we get the feeling that the state is wary about waging an all out war with the enemies of peace for reasons not entirely unknown. For all the flak that KPS Gill has drawn on how he handled the Punjab militancy, today Punjab is a peaceful state which has left its violent saga well behind. Gill once strode the canvas of this state like a Colossus. If he was given a task he performed it well. There was a toughness about the guy that would have sent the shivers down the spine of thugs like Sohan Shira. Are we lacking in such mental and physical toughness today? There was a time when cops saw the death of their colleagues as a personal affront. Today they seem to take such deaths in their stride. As one letter writer in these columns lamented, the only people who miss the dead policemen are their family members. For everyone else it’s back to business as usual by the next day. But a pall of gloom hangs over the heads of the lower rung policemen who are sent on odd duties without the wherewithal and that in a militant “infested” area. Is this how Meghalaya is going to tackle the menace of militancy? Is this also why we have new armed outfits mushrooming in Garo Hills?
The Wangala Festival is at hand. There will be speeches galore from the high and mighty about why peace is important for the development of Garo Hills. Ironically those who preach peace also demonstrate that they need maximum security even as the common person is left vulnerable to militant attacks. The chief minister’s security entourage is a demonstration that those in power are well guarded but the common man had better look after himself. This is no way to run the state. It is time to invest in better intelligence systems, better training, better hardening of the human spirit. You need cowboys to deal with cowboys. It is depressing to believe that Sohan Shira is better armed, more battle-ready, better informed and also has more resources at his command to ambush the police at will. The GNLA evidently knows the movements of the Police better than the Police know theirs. It’s unacceptable! There are serious loopholes somewhere in intelligence gathering. Or the GNLA must have infiltrated the Police and knows in advance what they are planning and how they intend to execute their plans. Money talks and with so many able-bodied unemployed youth around why are we be surprised if many more join the GNLA especially with its recent success rate. If the GNLA morale is high today then the police morale is low. This needs to be countered by different strategies which police will know better. But maybe our police force is not equipped with hard core, counter-insurgency training. If they did they would have been on top of things.
Counter-insurgency requires a different mental make-up. If the enemy is tough, you have to be tougher. That’s the rule of the game. That’s how it’s played. One thing that militants depend heavily upon are resources. Money, arms and manpower are important resources for both sides – the police and the militants. The police know where the GNLA gets its income from. Why are those sources not choked? Although there is a certain honour even among thieves, neither the NSCN (IM) or the ULFA would be willing to sell weapons to a customer whose ability to pay is suspect. One reason why the Bodo militants, the ULFA and NSCN are courting the GNLA is because they have the capacity to pay for both weapons and training.
Now let’s come to the crux of the matter. No militant outfit can thrive without political patronage. The HNLC survived on extortion and political sponsorship. It lost its teeth after the then Government cut off its source of funding and warned politicians who had truck with the HNLC that they would be exposed. It is time to use both tactics with the GNLA. Although there are good guesses about which of the powerful politicians from Garo Hills are hands in glove with the GNLA, it would sound even better if their names were made public. If the police do not want to be sitting ducks of the GNLA bullets then they might like to adopt the tested strategy of filing FIRs against all those who are funding the outfit. At the top of the list are coal mine owners, truck owners, business houses, contractors and some high ranking Government officials. The Government should dismantle all check/toll gates operating in Garo Hills from where a section of police also earn their keep. The presence of these toll gates has created anarchy and encouraged the mafia raj in Meghalaya. Toll gates are not yielding any revenue for the state. They are however making politicians who co-own these gates so filthy rich that they can live like royals in Shillong. There is therefore a symbiotic relation between politicians-militants and at some level the police also. My heart goes out to the foot soldiers in the police who have become victims of the GNLA’s target practice but I am equally enraged by those in the police force who are as venal as the GNLA. And there are quite a few who should actually be transferred to non-revenue generating stations. But can a Government that is non-transparent have the moral authority to transfer deviant cops?
It’s a no win situation for Meghalaya every which way we look at it. Corruption has eaten at the vitals of governance. We need political reforms of dynamic proportions. Until then all kinds of thugs will hold us the people to ransom!