Crime: Attari Scandal, The Great Train Robbery

Attari is infamous for the contraband-laden Samjhauta Express. But a customs-smuggler nexus may not want the gravy train to end its journey.

Sipping lemon tea in HIS roomy first floor office in central Delhi, Assistant Commissioner of Police Rajbir Singh stops a moment, grits his teeth and barks to no one in particular, "They should shut down that train. It's giving us sleepless nights." He is referring to the Samjhauta Express, ferrying passengers between Delhi and Lahore twice a week, every Monday and Thursday.

FACT SHEET ATTARI

Aside from routine smuggling of dry fruit and the like, narcotics and fake currency have been detected. Since January 31 Rs 23 lakh in bogus notes, and five guns have been apprehended.

In 1998, the DRI seized 700 kg of poppy husk worth Rs 1 crore from smugglers. It had been cleared by customs officials without any duty. The assistant commissioner of Attari was suspended.

Custom revenue is barely Rs 1 lakh per trip. The IB alleges that professional moneylenders outside the station lend passenger-couriers as much as Rs 15-20 lakh per train to bribe officials to undervalue dutiable goods.

There are seven security agencies working at the station but to no avail.

Some of the smuggling/sawari operators have leased orchards on the Pakistan border.

The anger is more understandable. To the special branch of Delhi Police, where Rajbir works, the Samjhauta is now a conduit for drug running and for the isi to bring in fake currency. It was thanks to information from the cell that on February 29 fake currency worth Rs 20 lakh was recovered from a passenger. The tip was useful; but the iceberg runs deep.

Fathoming the depths is, of course, far easier in Attari than in Delhi. Thirty km from Amritsar, Attari has got to be India's strangest railway station. For five days a week it is as silent as a graveyard; on the other two it buzzes like there's no tomorrow. The train from Delhi arrives at 4:45 a.m. and leaves 20 hours later -- "whenever customs lets it go". Its twin from Lahore chugs in "anytime between 12:20 and 4:00 p.m. and leaves half an hour after it gets here".

Praveen Sinha, SP, Amritsar, sums up Attari's identity crisis, "Bus station gentry, rail station locale, airport systems." The pieces don't always fit.

Attari, simply put, is in the grip of "sawari operators" -- masterminds of a cross-border courier-smuggler network. Their contraband is well known. From India, it comprises innocuous pressure cookers, fabric and the more sinister acetic anhydride -- a liquid that refines raw opium into smack and, in India, costs a tenth of the price in Pakistan. From the other side come dry fruit -- so much cheaper than here that passengers are known to carry quintals -- narcotics and, increasingly, fake currency.

The carriers are almost always poor, otherwise innocent folk who have been cajoled into carrying goods by a sympathetic operator. Police say the couriers tend to pick up a consignment in the Machhli Bazaar-Jama Masjid region of Old Delhi and deliver it to the Bichhu Bazaar-Dilli Gate area in Lahore. In return, these passenger-couriers have their tickets (Rs 105 from Delhi to Lahore or the other way round) paid for and get a little extra too.

To be fair the sawari racket is an old story on the Samjhauta, which began its spluttering if forlorn goodwill mission in 1976. What is remarkable is that it defies being tamed. Seven security and intelligence agencies are stationed here -- Immigration (Punjab Police), Government Railway Police (GRP), Customs (Preventive), Customs (Baggage), Punjab Police Counter-Intelligence, raw and the ib. In addition, there is the Railway Protection Force, which looks after rail property, the Military Intelligence, which functions in the environs, and the Directorate of Revenue Intelligence (DRI).

Yet, if you want to see proof of India's porous border, just go to Attari. The agencies spend their time pointing fingers at each other. Talk to operators -- you can meet some over tea in nearby dhabas -- and they laugh and tell you everybody's on the take: "Don't worry, we'll get to the platform by nightfall."

The sawari operators are the key to this trade. Delhi Police has a list of 61 names, 33 of them women. With names like Babbo (AKA Raisa), Dilshad, Raffo and Sabra, these women rule the roost. In fact, activities of these "begums" formed the bulk of a secret report by K.K. Sharma, then deputy commissioner, customs at Attari, to the Finance Ministry in December 1998, a report India today has access to.

The six-page report baldly states "it is as if they (begums-operators) rather than the enforcement agencies ... call the shots at Attari". Each operator sends "five to six carriers" per train. "Often," it adds, "their baggage contains parcels for obliging officers from GRP, Immigration, customs and even IB and raw." These "officers also organise the customs clearance". Six months after the report, Sharma was suddenly transferred.

Platform 2 is supposed to be a sanitised zone, completely free of non-passengers and non-officials. This isn't always so. Sharma's report speaks of an incident in which "customs officials dared to open extra baggage and detained for adjudication the baggage of Sabra's carriers. She reached the counter in no time despite tight security of GRP and customs at the entrance to platform 2, abused the officer at the counter in full public view, threatened of consequences and withdrew with equal ease". Other operators are less brazen, preferring to have messages relayed through coolies. In theory, coolies are not allowed entry to platform 2 -- but they sometimes try to slip in, attempting to do so even while our team was there. The coolies stand on platform 3 across a wire mesh that separates the two platforms.

If a sawari or an operator runs into trouble or if a customs official is playing difficult, the coolie gets to work. He runs to the moneylenders -- there's a whole slew of them from Amritsar -- outside the station and seeks a loan. Depending on the operator's credentials, the moneylender fixes the interest rate (generally a flat 2 per cent, with repayment in two days).

It's a good life. An IB official tells an apocryphal story of how a coolie used to drive a Maruti to work. In February, 13 of Attari's 102 coolies had their licences revoked following reports of their complicity in smuggling. Nine others, set to be punished, are either dead or absconding. Nevertheless, the dealmaking continues.

The deal follows this pattern: if a passenger is required to pay, say, Rs 50,000 as duty, the official charges him only, say, Rs 10,000. A portion of the differential is to be paid to the coolie -- or other designated middleman -- outside the station. To ensure that the passenger doesn't cheat, the official hands him a paper with a coded message only his agent will recognise. This paper is known in local parlance as a "Phagwara chit".

The moneylender-sawari operator-customs nexus is a fairly accepted practice in Attari. IB estimates say that on each of the two days the Samjhauta arrives "moneylenders outside dole out between Rs 15 and 20 lakh". The customs collection, even by the admission of Rajesh Jindal, deputy commissioner, customs (land), Attari, "rarely crosses Rs 1 lakh".

Even since January 31, when the Home Ministry tightened the screws and customs resorted to 100 per cent checking -- going through every piece of luggage -- duty garnered has hovered between Rs 17,000 and Rs 30,000, sometimes even less. So where does the rest of the money go? Whose pockets does it line?

Sharma's report indicts other departments as well and alleges that the operators "generally stay in GRP quarters located by platform 1". Even so the focus of attention -- and investigation -- has to be the Customs Department. Circumstantial evidence is fairly damaging. In 1997, the Customs and Central Excise Commisionerate in Chandigarh was broken up and a separate commissioner appointed for Amritsar. In the summer of 1999, the 500-odd class IV security staff in Chandigarh went on a month's strike demanding transfer to Attari under a common cadre programme. Talk to the ever-smiling D.S. Sra, commissioner, customs, Amritsar, and he admits, "Attari is a much sought after posting."

The cosy existence has obviously fetched generous returns. In the final part of his report, Sharma refers to a well-known operator called Babbo -- from Kairana tehsil, Muzaffarnagar district, Uttar Pradesh, whose name figures on Delhi Police special branch's dossier -- leasing out orchards close to the border.

One plot in her control from 1996 to 1999 -- when, presumably after Sharma's report, the lease was cancelled -- was a 101-acre mango orchard half a kilometre from Wagah. Others are in Kotli and Ranjitbagh, both in Gurdaspur district. While Gurdaspur police officials dismissed this allegation, india today had no trouble identifying the plots and even speaking to "Babbo's brother" and "niece". They could offer no coherent explanation as to why they left faraway Muzaffarnagar to lease out orchards on the Indo-Pakistani border.

Intelligence officials say the orchards serve a dual purpose. One, since agricultural income is not taxed, earnings from these can be inflated to launder money. Two, since they lie on the Amritsar-Pathankot road that leads to Jammu, they could be used as sanctuary for militants.

With zero romance and even less hygiene, Samjhauta is not one of the great trains of the world. Nevertheless, if a single rail route can foster an entire black economy, this is it. The gravy train can yet be derailed. The point is: does anybody in Attari have the will?

TRACKING THE TRAFFIC

"I only wanted to make some money to get my daughter married."
Mushtaq Ahmed, Sawari
On March 13, Delhi-resident Mushtaq Ahmed and his wife, Farida Begum, arrived on the Samjhauta from Pakistan carrying 20 sacks (roughly a quintal each) of dry fruit. They admitted to being sawaris in the pay of Shahi Chuha, a well-known sawari operator, and were promised Rs 3,000 between them. They had no money to pay duty but were confident Chuha would turn up and bail them out. He had promised to come "at night".

"I'll pay Rs 200 and get to the platform at night. Rest assured."
Hameeda, Operator
Hameeda is always in Attari to receive her "guests" (sawaris). She figures in police dossiers, carries a visiting card. And at 8.00 pm was sauntering close to "sanitised" platform 2.

"Why can't we lease an orchard here? How is it your business what we do?"
Abdul Hamid, Caretaker
Hamid says he's the brother of Babbo, a notorious sawari operator, and looks after her leased orchard in Ranjitbagh, Gurdaspur. He can't explain quite why he's here from his native Uttar Pradesh. Sources smell something more sinister.

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	April 3, 2000