That night I returned to my headquarters after reconnoitering of the forward areas. At the headquarters I met col. Sharma of 19 Raj RIF. We held discussions for future actions. The Indian army's role, as on that day was to halt any Pakistani attempt to cross the international border on the pretext of pursuing the Freedom Fighters. At the same time, the Indian Army was in a position to provide limited support to us as the launching base for various raids and ambushes. Soon after we had finished discussions capt. Mahfuz cntered the room to give us a good news. About 10 days earlier we had sent a special guerilla team to demolish the railway bridge between Dhumghat and Muhuriganj. It was a difficult task as the bridge was guarded. Purposefully we refrained from any activity in that area and as such the sentries on duty were not very alert. Many of our guerillas in nearby villages were advised to lic law and keep observing the Pakistanis and their habits and wait for the final raid. They were also required to provide safe base for the raiding party, guide them upto the target area and help them withdraw to safety after the raid was over.
The raiding party along with the demolition experts were launched inside in the last weak of September. They carried out rehearsals of the action on a small bridge near the sub-sector HQ. Explosives for the action were dispatched in a number of installments to avoid detection. These were stocked in 2-isolated farm houses-only about a mile away from the target. Thereafter the main guerilla group moved inside and reached the target area. There, the party carried out detail reconnaissance for a number of days and observed the duty pattern of the sentries, their state of alertness, timings of change of sentry etc. Finally the raid was carried out on the night of 6 October and the bridge could only be damaged partially. This however disrupted the railway communication between Chittagong and Dhaka.
During this time a rumour spread that a section of the politicians who were actually collaborators in disguise, were trying for a rapprochement with Pakistan. The rumour spread quickly. The soldiers as well as the guerillas and the people were greatly agitated. There were demands for sever punishment of the collaborators and we vowed to achieve military solution to the problem since the Pakistanis had blocked the path for a political dialogue. The fighting men were advised to hit the enemy harder for a decisive military victory.
On 10 October the guerillas raided Pakistani position in Barabazar in which Pakistanis suffered 6 casualties.
On October 12 there was a raid on Pakistani defences at Parshuram area. 2 sentries were killed and the guerillas withdrew immediately after the raid, lasting only fifteen minutes.
At 9-30 p.m. the guerillas ambushed Pakistani patrol near Radhanagar on Dhaka-Chittagong road. 2 soldiers were killed and I was injured.
That night Pakistani President Yahya Khan, speaking on the Pakistan Radio mentioned of heavy Indian build up all along Pakistani border and of commando activities in which roads, railway bridges and power supply lines had been destroyed. From the
