‘No wonder, sir, the Pakistan rangers have been firing since yesterday. They were providing cover for these terrorists to sneak in,’ Singh said when narrating what had happened to his superior on the wireless.

Punjab’s districts along the international border were not new to random shelling. India’s security forces and intelligence agencies, however, knew that the shelling by the Pakistan rangers always had a purpose and was never random. In the 1980s and ’90s, such shelling would coincide with attempts to launch trained Khalistani terrorists into India for terror missions.

There were several pro-Khalistan outfits whose top leadership was hosted and funded by the Pakistani Deep State, that is, the army and the ISI. The most active amongst the Khalistani outfits, operating out of Lahore and Karachi, were the Khalistan Liberation Commandos and the International Sikh Youth Group.

7. ‘LEADER IS IN INDIA ALREADY’

7

‘LEADER IS IN INDIA ALREADY’

Four hours after the police encounter in Khemkaran, Jigar was yanked out of a cell at the Shahid Bhagat Singh police station. The station house officer, Hoshiyaar Singh, wanted to see him.

Hoshiyaar had spent the last fifteen years of his career on assignments in border districts and preferred the rough but direct method of dealing with people detained or arrested for alleged involvement in terrorism and espionage. He did not believe in the ‘carrot and stick’ technique, the employment of both soft and hard approaches to extract information from a subject.

For Jigar, a team was in place to grill him. Apart from Hoshiyaar and his aides, Constable Sucha Singh, Head Constable Sangram Singh and CTC’s Shekhar were also there.

Shekhar had been woken up at 4 a.m. by a phone call from his boss. He had asked him to rush to Delhi’s Palam airport, where a chartered chopper was waiting to take him to Khemkaran. From the Khemkaran airstrip, a police car took him to the Shahid Bhagat Singh police station.

His boss had also briefed him: ‘A fifteen-year-old boy has been nabbed with two Pakistan-trained Sikh terrorists, who crossed over from Pakistan, then killed two cops in a midnight encounter.’

Shekhar was asked to find out why the trio had infiltrated into India and, specifically, why a fifteen-year-old boy had been sent.

The boy’s questioning began at 8.15 a.m. Hoshiyaar began with the basics.

‘What’s your name, Junior? Your two uncles gave us your name, but I want you to confirm it. Speak up!’ Hoshiyaar Singh screamed at the boy.

‘You came here to plant bombs at movie theatres in Delhi on 26 January? At Minerva, Ram and Liberty theatres in Delhi’s Connaught Place? Gift of death on our Republic Day, is it?’

When the boy refused to speak, Hoshiyaar continued. ‘We know who you are, Junior! Do you want to talk? Your hands are already broken in several places; shall we break some more? You are young but mixed up with vile, murderous people…