In an alarming development the Gorkha Janmukti Morcha was allying with the leftist ultras as part of a two-pronged strategy for a separate Gorkhaland State, Intelligence reports say.
The Hill outfit was planning a sustained armed struggle while keeping the present façade of a non-violence movement intact. To further its cause the group had established contacts with the Maoist guerillas of some neighbouring countries.
The Maoist mercenaries were being hired to train the youth wing of the GJM, ADG law and order Anuj Sharma said adding as a part of new strategy the group would escalate attacks on the Government properties besides targeting government officials provoking the administration to go on the counter-offensive which in turn could trigger move violent backlashes.
About 50 Maoist guerillas were imparting training to the Gorkhaland Personnel the armed wing of the GJM, that had temporarily suspended its operation after the outfit assumed power in now defunct Gorkhaland Territorial Administration, sources said.
This was the region why Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee had sent senior IPS officer Manoj Verma experienced in handling Maoist insurgency in Jangalmahal as IGP of Darjeeling range, sources said.
The entire operation would go on behind the veneer of a ‘non-violent’ movement that could also include indefinite hunger strikes, to win the sympathy of the outer world sources said. In fact one of their senior leaders Benoy Tamang had planned to start an indefinite fast before being asked by Morcha chief Bimal Gurung to postpone the programme for the time being.
“Already they are acting on that strategy of a violent movement. The torching of Government vehicles and offices is part of that strategy,” said a senior police officer who was recently posted in Darjeeling.
Incidentally Gurung recently said “whatever you are seeing now is a trailer. The real movie is to follow.”
When contacted Akash Gurung a GJM leader denied reports of his party’s Maoist links saying the Government was planting stories to pump in more central forces to Darjeeling and “destroy our democratic movement by leveling false charges and creating grounds to either arrest our men or shoot them dead as their police have done to seven of our young supporters.”