Smuggling for Tigers in Tamil Nadu goes on despite crackdown

India is fast becoming a focal point for the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) to fund its war against Sri Lanka, Times Now reported.

Times Now travelled to Rameshwaram to decode the outfits’ supply chain and to expose the nexus between the Tamil fishermen and LTTE operatives.

Investigations led to a fisherman, who has close links with the smuggling ring, and act as an agent for LTTE.

The man explained the ease with which smuggling still goes on despite repeated crackdowns.

“In this trade there are agents. They live here amongst us and they are the ones who identify the fishermen and its through them that goods are transported from India to Sri Lanka. Once in 15 days or once in a month goods are carried across. There are about 15 people who do this and they all carry it at different times of the month,” he said.

The supply chain starts with the LTTE agents, who control procurement modules. They are mainly Sri Lankan refugees at Mandapam refugee camp in Rameshwaram and even some Indians.

These agents after finalising the ferry, smuggle goods to fishing villages, from where they are taken to various points of Sri Lanka, the fisherman said.

“They take it out at night without the officials’ knowledge and load it onto the boats even the Indian Navy doesn’t find out.

They pretend they’re carrying the goods for their own use, and then go across the ocean and give it. What the LTTE needs mainly are explosives and medicines and of course diesel,” says the agent.

The temple town of Rameshwaram is 20 nautical miles away from Thalai Mannar, the LTTE’s nodal transit point in Sri Lanka. The short distance and calm waters make it easier to evade detection by Indian Navy patrols.

With India and Sri Lankan Navy manning these waters, smuggling is not an easy task. “For taking the goods across once we get Rs. 50,000 to Rs. 1 lakh. Taking the goods across the Ocean is a big risk.

And they look beyond their safety when they do this.” Says K.P. Jain, Director General of Police Tamil Nadu: “We have booked some of the smugglers who were supplying goods to militants in Sri Lanka.