HP police to recruit Tibetan and Chinese speaking agents to counter Chinese espionage threats

By Choekyi Lhamo

DHARAMSHALA, Oct. 28: The DGP Sanjay Kundu of Himachal Pradesh police on Saturday said that the department had requested the central government for three skilled investigators to be inducted in the Criminal Investigation Department (CID) to keep a check on Chinese espionage threats in the view of the recent case of Rs. 1000 crores hawala racket. The head of the police department specifically noted the need for the skilled agents to be fluent in both Chinese and Tibetan languages. 

“We realised that the Chinese threats and the Tibetan issue would remain alive in Himachal, so we need to be more equipped to confront such matters. We were unable to interrogate the suspects since we are not efficient in any of the two languages. We always have to depend on central agencies for further investigation,” said DGP Kundu during the press conference. The statement further noted that if the request is approved, the three agents will be posted in Dharamshala, Shimla and Kullu respectively.

The recent hawala racket that exposed the Chinese national Luo Sang with the fake identity of ‘Charlie Peng’ got arrested on Aug. 11 for charges including the money laundering and hawala racket. Sang eventually admitted to interrogators that he worked as a spy and had two prime tasks; to enter the inner circle of Dalai Lama for which he made several trips to Himachal Pradesh and Tibetan colony Majnu-ka-tilla in Delhi, and also to assist Chinese embassy officials help transfer money and arrange logistics for them like providing cars and arranging their travel.

A Tibetan-origin Chinese intelligence agent was caught years ago from Dharamshala, considered to be the exile capital of the Tibetan diaspora. Both His Holiness the Dalai Lama and the exile Tibetan government are based in Dharamshala.