PLA supplying arms to Maoists : NIA
Source: The Sangai Express / Courtesy : TNN
New Delhi, December 19 2012:
Left wing extremists (LWE) had been procuring Chinese arms and communication equipment from banned Manipuri outfit, People's Liberation Army (PLA), via Myanmar and routing it to Kolkata through Guwahati between 2006 and 2011, a supplementary chargesheet filed by the National Investigation Agency (NIA) in the CPI (Maoist)-PLA nexus case has revealed.
According to the chargesheet, all the communication equipment recovered from Maoists have made-in-China marks, while arms recovered from PLA members too belonged to Chinese brands.
It is, however, yet to be established conclusively whether they came from China and were routed via Myanamar or were pilfered out of Myanmar or some other source.
The chargesheet has been filed against Maoist leaders Pallab Borborah, Indranil Chanda and PLA's external affairs chief Asem Ibotombi Singh alias Angou, who were all arrested this year from Assam, Kolkata and Odisha, respectively.
The accused are alleged have played a significant role in training of Maoists by PLA in Jharkhand's Saranda forests apart from procurement of arms and communication equipment.
Earlier, NIA had filed a chargesheet against three top PLA leaders � N Dilip Singh alias Wangba, Senjam Dhiren Singha alias Raghu and Kh Arnold Singh alias Becon.
One of the main evidence against the accused in the chargesheet is the email that PLA members had exchanged among themselves, and their Myanmar-based bosses.
The emails exposed the nexus, helping agencies to sniff them out.
"Maoists use very little modern technology.
They rely on human couriers.
But PLA members regularly wrote e-mails to their bosses in Myanmar.
This exposed them," said an official privy to the probe.
The emails also mentioned aliases of Borborah and Chanda whose real identity was later established following statements of former PLA and Maoist members and are part of the chargesheet.
The chargesheet says the nexus was initiated by then PLA external affairs chief Gypsy Sharma in 2006 .
Later, Becon was appointed as the liaison officer and sent to Kolkata to coordinate the operation, where he met Chanda.
However, for the first two years no deal could be struck save for PLA gifting some arms and communication equipment to conduct tests.
In 2008, when Wangba replaced Gypsy Sharma in the PLA, he took one CPI (Maoist) central committee member to Myanmar, where Maoists and PLA signed a joint declaration against the Indian state and mooted the idea of forming a United Strategic Front.
The first payment to procure arms was made in 2009.A deal was struck to procure arms and communication equipment worth Rs 50 lakh.
A total of Rs 33 lakh in three installments was paid before the accused were arrested.
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