Is This Story About Ikram Sehgal True ?‏ 04-Jun-2011, 05:28 AM http://www.siasat.pk/forum/showthread.php?68358-Is-This-Story-About-Ikram-Sehgal-True-%E2%80%8F

Ikram Sehgal is an ex-army officer.His father was also a retired Colonel who had commanded 2 East Bengal Regiment that was raised prior to 1950.The mother of Ikram Sehgal was from Bogra where as his father was from Punjab.While I was watching a talk show, Ikram sehgal had claimed that he was the first Pakistani POW to have escaped from the Indian Camp.He is now running a well-entrenched security company SMS (probably joined now by Wackenhut), acquired a reputation of a Defence Analyst and is rubbing shoulders with the high and mighty in our land of the pure.The fact of the matter is that he was not a POW but had defected to India.This is what Lt Gen (R) Kamal Matinuddin has written on pages 251-252 in Chapter 5- Military Action of his book Tragedy of Errors while covering East Bengal Regiments Rebel.

“2 East Bengal Regiment

2 East Bengal Regiment at the old palace at Joydebpur had been split into companies and platoon.A company was at Tangail, another at Mymensingh, one platoon of the third company was at Rajenderpur, and one platoon at Ghazipur.Its task was to enforce law and order.
The battalion was commanded by Lt Col Masaudul Hussain Khan an officer hailing from East Pakistan.The second-in-command was Major K.M.Safiullah, also a Bengali officer.Safiullah, recalls with pride that after March 1, (when the national assembly session had been postponed) he no longer felt obliged to remain loyal to the West Pakistan officers.He decided to support the Awami League and awaited orders from Sheikh Mujib-ur-Rehman.He goes on to narrate that after that date 2 East Bengal began to secretly join the movement od non-cooperation.When the city hoisted black flags on Pakistan’s national day Safiullah recalls that in his heart of hearts he was not opposed to the fluttering of black flags on a day when he used to proudly display the crescent and star on his housetop.

On March 27, Major Safiullah told his commanding officer “We intend to go over to Sheikh Mujib-ur-Rehman you may go away if you wish or you are most welcome to join us.We can even tie you and leave you in one room to give the impression that you were not part of the mutiny. Lt Col Raquib, who had taken over from Lt Col Masaudul hasan, left the unit quietly as disloyalty was not what he had trained for. He was heard of no more.

Safiullah concentrated 2 East Bengal in Mymensingh and took an oath of allegiance to Sheikh Mujib from his troops. He broadcast a message on his regimental frequency to all those who may have been listening. “I, major Safiullah of the East bengal Regiment, have taken up arms against the Pakistan Army. If you are a Bengali, wherever you sre, take up arms with whatever you have against the Pakistanis and begin an armed resistance to liberate your country from the colonial fetters of Pakistan’.He sent Captain Aziz-ur Rehman to haluaghat to establish contact with the Indian Border Security Force Aziz met the commandant of the BSF while Safiullah met Capt Biljeet and Lt Col sinha of the Indian intelligence. The response, says safiullah, to his request was favourable. 2 East bengal was joined by three retired officers. Major Qazi Noor-uz-zaman (2nd IMA course), Captain Mati-ur-Rehman and Captain Abdul Mateen.Safiullah claims that he was able to organise of 3,000 with eight officers including Captain Sehgal who had defected from the army aviation squadron.

2 East Bengal began to ambush the Pakistani army around Mymensingh and in the vicinity of the Mahdopur forests which remained sanctuary for some time.They blew up bridges the most important being the Ranipur railway bridge across the river Ganges. The unit later moved across to India through Rajshahi, virtually intact.2 East Bengal had 4 West Pakistani officers and a few West Pakistani soldiers. All of them were killed by Safiullah’s men”.

“UNQUOTE”

Belligerent Benazir inadvertently helped Musharraf Kamran Khan Friday, November 23, 2007 http://www.thenews.com.pk/TodaysPrintDetail.aspx?ID=11319&Cat=13&dt=11/23/2007

KARACHI: Just three weeks after pushing Pakistan into the second emergency rule of his eight-year reign, President Gen Pervez Musharraf appears to have survived the strongest challenge yet to his hold on power. The Pakistan Army is still standing solidly behind him, the United States is ‘’pretty comfortable’’ with the situation and his fractious political supporters are busy in getting their act together for the elections.

Based on this recovered confidence, anchored in American and Army support, President Musharraf is now getting ready to step down as Chief of Army Staff within the next few days, say his associates.

According to an important aide, President Musharraf’s articulation of views and candour were at their best when he spoke to President Bush in an unpublicised telephone conversation early last week. During this dialogue, he convinced Bush that the emergency was imposed for “only a few weeks” in the best interests of democracy. This landmark telephone conversation between President Bush and President Musharraf, kept secret from the media in both countries, was also used by Musharraf to provide a timetable for the complete restoration of democracy in Pakistan to the person who is perhaps his best international friend.

Musharraf followed up the promise made to Bush during this conversation when he gave the date for the general elections and ordered the release of thousands of political detainees. President Bush was clearly happy and he couldn’t resist expressing his satisfaction publicly on Wednesday by declaring one more time: “I think he (Musharraf) truly is somebody who believes in democracy.”

In an interview with this correspondent in February last year, President Bush had said that he shared Musharraf’s “vision for democracy.” Now 21 months later, Bush said last Wednesday, “I do believe that he’s going to end up getting Pakistan back on the road to democracy, I certainly hope so.”

Opposition politicians, particularly Benazir Bhutto, are discouraged. But what she is probably unaware of is that her belligerent political posturing since her return to Pakistan last month, reinforced the perception among the country’s military commanders that it was the worst time to lift support from Musharraf. More ominously, Bhutto’s combative statements dealt a severe blow to her desire of finally making peace with the Pakistani military establishment.

“What does Ms Bhutto expect from the Army or the people when she starts her day by demanding that the US cut off aid to the Pakistani military,” asked a general not authorised to speak on the record with the media . “I know Gen Musharraf and Gen Kiyani (Vice Chief of Army Staff) had a hard time selling the NRO (National Reconcliation Ordinance) to senior commanders,” the same general claimed. He said General Musharraf’s decision to grant amnesty to Benazir was considered a highly unpopular decision within the institution.

“Her statements on AQ Khan and the Army’s role in curbing militancy had already complicated the situation before she launched the aid cut-off campaign in the western media,” another Army general explained during a private conversation last week. “The notion that she is playing to the gallery in western capitals is gaining ground in the Army in particular and the country in general,” he said.

This became evident when the visiting United States Deputy Secretary of State John Negroponte was informed by the government during his visit to Islamabad last week that his desire to arrange a personal meeting with Ms Bhutto would carry negative consequences.

Negroponte got a detailed sense of this perception during his meetings with President Musharraf and two meetings with Vice Chief of Army Staff General Ashfaq Pervez Kiyani, an informed official said.

During several private conversations with senior military and intelligence officials over the last several days, a consensus view seemed emerging. In this view, international forces were using discontent against President Musharraf to undermine the institution of the Army in Pakistan.

This perception within the Army emanated from the campaign to reinstate the chief justice when the angry lawyers allegedly failed to distinguish between President Musharraf and the largely apolitical Pakistan Army. Their slogans, even in the presence of Justice Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry, allegedly targeted the rank and file of the Army and the media ran the campaign unedited, several Army officials claimed.

An element of mystery was added in the military minds when Ms. Bhutto, backed by huge support from the western media, suddenly opted to increase pressure on General Musharraf by demanding the US to cut military aid to “nuclear-armed” Pakistan.

Hence the final decision was taken in informal and formal discussions between the corps commanders and Gen Musharraf just before and after the imposition of emergency to completely detach the Army from civil governance under the new Army chief General Ashfaq Pervez Kiyani and to maintain strategic support to President Musharraf’s vision for democracy which the GHQ is most happy to share with President George Bush.

This was the period when the military commanders also turned down President Musharraf’s offer to quit both as the Army chief and president if that would help restore the much desired civil- military balance of power in Pakistan. According to a reliable official’s account of the meetings and conversations that took place between President Musharraf and several corps commanders and principal staff officers in the last week of October and the first week of this month.

Barring an unprecedented development, the Army seems ready to vanish from the public eye, even to the extent that senior Army officers may be asked to restrict their contacts with civilians only to close relatives and old friends.

KARACHI: When Prime Minister Syed Yousuf Raza Gilani hinted in the National Assembly on Wednesday that institution of a treason case against Pervez Musharraf was not “doable”, he was actually alluding to those unwritten assurances provided to the former military ruler from the ruling coalition, military leadership and Pakistan’s trusted international friends in the week that followed his resignation from the office on Monday, August 18, last year, according to most informed political and security sources. Asking the opposition led by the PML-N not to play to the gallery on the issue of Musharraf’s trial, the prime minister advised the House on Wednesday that: “We should do what is doable,” Gilani, intentionally, did not elaborate the “doable”.

Multiple sources with direct knowledge of what happened in the corridors of power between August 11 and August 18 last year said that the deal that finally saw Musharraf’s departure was cobbled together by the top PPP leaders, including President Asif Ali Zardari and Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani, Chief of Army Staff General Ashfaq Parvez Kayani, US Ambassador to Pakistan Anne W Patterson, Britain’s special envoy to Pakistan Sir Mark Lyall Grant and an emissary of the King of Saudi Arabia. “The bottom line of this deal was to grant Pervez Musharraf a graceful departure from the Presidency with guarantees that there would no impeachment or court proceedings against him in future,” said a senior official with the direct knowledge of what happened in the decisive week.

“There is no guarantee to what happens to Musharraf in distant future, but the deal promises no official disgrace for Musharraf under the present government.” Prime Minister Gilani’s recent statement and President Zardari’s advice to “Friends” in an interview last week “to leave the politics of revenge” further testifies the sanctity of the arrangement reached in August last year. Notwithstanding the deal, senior PPP leaders seem convinced that Nawaz Sharif’s growing pressure on the government to file sedition charges against Musharraf were actually a political attempt from the PML-N to pitch the PPP government against the army.

“Mian Saheb, we [the PPP] have had enough of confrontation with the army and have given enough of sacrifices, this time please excuse us now, you go ahead and do the job,” this was the response of President Zardari to Nawaz Sharif when the later insisted that the government should go ahead and file sedition charges against Musharraf during President Zardari’s visit to Sharif’s Raiwind estate for a “courtesy meeting “ on 17th of last month. “This is a fantastic deal which none of the participants would own or confirm, yet there is nothing to suggest any violation of this unwritten agreement,” the official said. “Its more sacred than most written political agreements.” Units from all three military services gave Musharraf a final salute before a warm send-off by three services chiefs and the chairman Joint Chiefs of Staff Committee that followed his historic resignation speech.

“This was all very carefully choreographed to give a message to the nation and the world that no military rebuke was attached to Musharraf’s departure after nine years in the Presidency,” according to a senior security official. “Pakistan Army is least interested in General Musharraf’s political ambitions and its subsequent fallout, but his trial for past actions by this government would make things uncomfortable,” the same source observed. Another sources said the presidential security both from the army and civil law enforcing agencies including provisioning of armoured vehicles and continued stay at the Army House – the official residence of the army chief – were provided to the former president till he lived in Pakistan as part of the same deal.

The international element in Musharraf’s exit deal also promised similar treatment and protocol for him during his stay abroad. It may not be in common knowledge that during his stay in Britain, the British government has provided him a 24-hour security cover with armed personnel and armoured vehicle, an arrangement reserved for very important people in Britain. Incidentally, it was Britain that had played a key role in stitching the final deal for Musharraf’s departure by sending Sir Mark Lyall Grant, Britain’s former ambassador to Pakistan who is known for his deep personal ties with both top PPP and PML-N leadership, in the second week of August last year. “Sir Grant’s visit was a turning point,” informed an impeccable source. “He had the clout and ability to convince Musharraf that it was time to go and to simultaneously request Zardari and Nawaz Sharif not to mess with Musharraf’s departure, but the final screws were driven by General Kayani, whom the British envoy had met last.”

Sir Grant returned to London on August 14, as the army leadership began to write the final act in Musharraf’s saga in power. Incidentally, on August 15 last year, only a day after Sir Grant’s return to London from Islamabad, respected Financial Times wrote an editorial under the headline: “Bye Bye Musharraf.” Giving an identical advice given to top Pakistan political leadership by Sir Grant in the last few days, the Financial Times wrote in the same editorial: “But that [Musharraf’s imminent departure] does not mean it [Pakistan Army] will stand by and watch General Musharraf, its former chief of staff, humiliated by parliamentary impeachment. The ruling coalition must not overplay its hand because Pakistan cannot afford another layer of crisis.” Multi-layered efforts were made from London to Washington to Islamabad to Riyadh to make sure that political leadership, particularly Nawaz Sharif, does not try to disrupt Musharraf’s graceful departure. Various sources confirmed that in the final act before Musharraf retired to his bedroom Sunday night to prepare for his resignation speech due next day morning, the military leadership, including Gen Kayani, CJCSC Gen Tariq Majid, the then ISI DG Lt Gen Nadeem Taj and Rawalpindi Corps Commander Lt Gen Mohsin Kamal, spoke at length with their former commander in chief and soothed him with heartfelt assurances on future treatment. On a separate front Sir Mark Lyall Grant’s clear message to Musharraf was followed by similar messages, in shape of telephone calls, from the then United States Vice President Dick Cheney and Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice.

At the same time, US Ambassador Anne W Patterson was working phones and meeting political and military leadership in Islamabad to ensure that a formal end of nine years of military rule in Pakistan remains as smooth as possible. On political front Messers Mark Grant and Anne Patterson secured full assurance from both Asif Zardari and Premier Gilani that they were not interested in any impeachment or future trial of Pervez Musharraf and at the same Muttahida Qaumi Movement and Awami National Party in direct communication with the former president informed him that they would like a graceful departure for him, and, in future also, they would not be part of any political attempt to drag him to courts.

An interesting behind the scenes meeting that took place between Musharraf and the ANP President Asfandyar Wali at the height of the controversy over his future remained secret to the media. At least two senior official sources insisted that Musharraf finally made up his mind to resign after a private conversation with the Custodian of two holy mosques King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia on August 16, 2008. “King Abdullah backed Musharraf’s decision with a firm affirmation of continued close personal relationship and offered him to consider Saudi Arabia as his homeland,” one source said. Since leaving, Musharraf is believed to be in touch with King Abdullah whom he met also in May this year.

After the private visit, King Abdullah gave Musharraf his private royal aircraft for a return journey to London from Riyadh. “I’m sure if Nawaz Sharif raised temperature for Musharraf’s trial under treason, King Abdullah would intervene on Musharraf’s behalf.” This was an impression gathered by one of Musharraf’s friend after the former president’s last meeting with King Abdullah. The deal to grant a secured graceful exit from power between the PPP, international powers, military and Pervez Musharraf was second in series of such unwritten deals whose sanctity was observed even under most difficult scenarios. For example, an unwritten agreement reached between Musharraf and Benazir Bhutto Shaheed as a result of their meetings in London and Abu Dhabi in 2007 remained intact even after Benazir Bhutto’s assassination when Musharraf continued in power several months after the elections in exchange for granting unprecedented pardon in all corruption cases registered under Nawaz Sharif government and pursued during his tenure as military ruler against many PPP leaders and federal and provincial officials.