Dhaka, Feb 10: Amateur Ham Radio operators have picked up suspicious late-night radio signals in coded Bengali, Urdu and Arabic along the Indo-Bangladesh border in South Bengal over the last two months, raising concerns about possible extremist activities, officials said.The development comes amidst ongoing unrest in Bangladesh and growing anti-India rhetoric in the neighbouring country.
The incident first came to light in December last when Ham radio operators detected unauthorised communications in coded Bengali, Arabic, and Urdu from Basirhat and Bongaon in North 24 Parganas, as well as from the Sunderbans in South 24 Parganas.
Alarmed by these transmissions, the operators informed the Ministry of Communications. The matter was subsequently forwarded to the International Monitoring Station (Radio) in Kolkata for tracking.
Ham radio operators have also been asked to monitor and report if similar signals are detected again.
“These suspicious radio signals have been picked up between 1 AM and 3 AM. The transmissions are in coded Bengali (with a Bangladeshi accent), Urdu, and Arabic. Sometimes, there are signals in another language that we couldn’t identify. Whenever we asked those communicating to identify themselves, they went silent,” Ambarish Nag Biswas, secretary of the West Bengal Radio Club, told PTI.
According to Biswas, the first such signal was detected by a Ham radio operator in Sodepur in North 24 Parganas district in mid-December.
“Initially, we did not attach much importance to it. But then similar signals were detected from Basirhat, Bongaon, and later from South 24 Parganas district. Even during the Gangasagar Mela in mid-January, several Ham radio users reported hearing these suspicious signals,” he said.
I informed my superiors in New Delhi, who then forwarded the matter to the International Monitoring Station (Radio) Kolkata for investigation. We have also been asked to continue tracking these signals,” he said.
A senior official from the Ministry of Communications confirmed that the matter had been forwarded to the International Monitoring Station (Radio) Kolkata for further examination.
A senior official from a security agency, who visited Biswas’ place for details, declined to comment on the matter.
When contacted, a senior BSF official acknowledged the seriousness of the situation, stating that unidentified radio chatter along the border is a matter of concern.
“If we receive details from Ham radio users, we will use our resources to track the source of these transmissions,” the BSF official said.