Contrary to a spate of speculative reports and Assam Chief Minister Tarun Gogoi welcoming the “surrender” of United Liberation Front of Asom (ULFA) leaders “responding to the wishes of the people of Assam”, its ‘chairman and deputy commander in chief’, Arabinda Rajkhowa alias Rajiv Rajkonwar, Raju Baruah and Raja Bora were handed over to India near the India-Bangladesh border in Dawki, on 4 December, 2009. Earlier, in a well planned Indian intelligence operation, based on inputs about Rajkhowa’s plans to escape from Bangladesh received soon after the “surrender” of ULFA finance secretary Chitrabon Hazarika and foreign secretary Shashadhar Chowdhury in early November, he was apprehended at Cox’ s Bazaar near Chittagong, while trying to cross over to Myanmar. All this has been made possible, albeit 20 years after ULFA top leaders crossed over to Bangladesh, owing to Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina’s the commitment to cooperate with India by denying shelter to ULFA, following her coming to power again with Awami League’s (AL) unprecedented 2008 electoral victory. Mr Hasan Mahmud, Bangladesh’s foreign minister and special assistant to Sheikh Hasina, during his visit to New Delhi on 18 February 2009 , promised a Bangladeshi crackdown on militant groups. However, ULFA’s ‘commander- in- chief’, Paresh Baruah along with a sizeable group, escaped to China just before AL assumed charge.
