Govt pressurised negotiators to end hijacking by Dec 31: Doval

Sumir Kaul
New Delhi, Jan 1 (PTI) Pressure from the Indian
government and hysteria back home by relatives of passengers
prevented negotiators to force the hijackers of an Indian
Airlines plane to scale down their demand to release just one
terrorist, says A K Doval, India's Chief negotiator.
Ten years after the traumatic passengers were released
after a costly exchange of three dreaded terrorists on New
Year eve, Doval, a former Intelligence Bureau (IB) chief, says
demands may have been reduced to release of just one terrorist
if negotiators had got some more time.
Pressure was building from the government to quickly
secure the release of passengers and finish the task before
the clock struck midnight heralding the new millennium, he
said.
"That was something that was adding pressure on us ki ab
app key paas 12 ghante bache hain (you have 12 hours left)...
the pressure was from the people. The pressure from the people
was on the government, the pressure from the government would
be transmitted to the negotiators and they were telling the
people are getting restless," 64-year-old Doval told PTI here.
The intelligence agencies negotiated with the terrorists
for seven days under tremendous domestic pressure to secure
the release of passengers.
The hijack crisis ended after three dreaded terrorists
--Maulana Masood Azhar, who later founded Jaish-e-Mohammed,
Mushtaq Ahmed Zargar and Ahmed Omar Saeed Sheikh--were
released in exchange for the lives of 149 passengers and a
15-member crew of the plane.
Many of the terror attacks in the country including the
2001 Parliament strike have been linked to the three freed
terrorists. (MORE) PTI