The unsung surgical strike - Wings of 'infiltrator' pigeon clipped, activist upset

The captured pigeon. (PTI)

Imran Ahmed Siddiqui, TT, New Delhi, Oct. 12: India's security agencies last week engaged in a "surgical strike" on a suspected infiltrator from across the Pakistan border but few are tom-tomming it from the rooftops yet.

The suspect is a grey pigeon, whose wings have been clipped to reduce the risk of flight.

Last heard, the alleged undercover agent was feeding on wheat and grams.

"The wings of the pigeon have been clipped to ensure the suspected spy does not fly back to Pakistan," a senior Punjab police official told The Telegraph.

"We have sent a preliminary report to the Union home ministry, including an X-ray report of the bird which did not reveal anything suspicious."

The pigeon was "arrested" on October 2 after a note addressed to Prime Minister Narendra Modi was found tied to its foot when it landed at the Border Security Force's Simbal post in Pathankot's Bamial sector.

The note, in Urdu, read "Modiji, we are not the same as we were in 1971 - Jaish-e-Mohammad", a police source said.

Today, an inspector at Bamial police station said the wings were clipped last week with the help of a veterinary worker. "We didn't want to take a chance. We also bought a cage for its stay."

The bird, which was taken to an animal husbandry hospital in Pathankot, has since been put in the cage and is being fed.

"We don't know how long the pigeon will stay in the police station. Residents are flocking to the police station to see the intruder," he said, adding the police weren't even sure that the bird had come from across the border.

"The only thing we know for sure is that it was a female pigeon and not a male one as assumed earlier," said another official.

The pigeon's arrest - reported in this paper on October 3 - had come two days after the Intelligence Bureau had issued an alert to Punjab police over a possible backlash from terrorists from across the border after the Indian Army's September 29 "surgical strikes" across the Line of Control.

Pathankot, the theatre of a futile search for four armed men late last month after local people reported suspicious 

movement, has been on high alert since the January 2 terrorist attack on an airbase.

Asked if clipping a bird's wings didn't amount to cruelty, a police officer said: "It's not cruelty. Clipped wings grow fast and the pigeon will be able to fly soon. It's hale and hearty as it is being fed well."

Delhi-based animal rights activist Gauri Maulekhi disagreed. "They should have released the pigeon since they didn't find anything suspicious after getting the X-ray done," she said. "The mindless act amounts to cruelty to animals. It also shows how stupid as a nation we are becoming."

Across the border, too, the response was scathing. The Dawn newspaper published a satirical piece, with pictures of random pigeons called Ghutarghoon Khan, the name mimicking the sound pigeons make.

One of the captions read: "My name is Ghutarghoon Khan and I am not a spy."

A senior IPS officer at North Block said this wasn't the first time that a bird from Pakistan had been caught and charged with spying. "Both countries have always accused each other of spying," the officer said, "but things are now getting farcical."