If you think illegally trespassing into India or Pakistan requires intelligence and a sharp brain to dupe extra vigilant security agencies manning the frontier, then think again. According to figures, more than seven per cent of those apprehended while crossing the Indo-Pak International Border in Gujarat in the last five years, were “insane”.

Intelligence agencies, however, frown at this insanity theory and say it needs to be probed properly.

According to figures accessed by this newspaper, a total of 359 people, including infiltrators as well as those who were caught while attempting to sneak into Pakistan from the Indian side, were apprehended at the Gujarat frontier by the Border Security Force between 2004 and 2008. Of these, a total of 27, according to the records, were insane or at least believed to be so.

Intelligence officers, however, say that some of these persons could only be posing as insane in a bid to dupe the police and carry out their mission discreetly under the guise of a mentally-unstable person.

Additional Director General of Police (Intelligence) P P Pandey said: “Posing as being insane after being caught is a gimmick we come across several times. While most of them break down during the joint interrogation by the different agencies and confess to having pretended being insane (apparently in a bid to dupe the security agencies), some are genuinely insane.”

Pandey also did not rule out the possibility that some of these people could be anti-nationals, terrorists or even Pakistani spies. “This possibility cannot be ruled out completely. We have alerted security agencies and the state police in the bordering areas to be watchful about this.”

The BSF, which nabs such people most of the time, says it hands them over to the state police. They are later interrogated at the Joint Interrogation Centre (JIC) in Bhuj. “Whether these pople are actually insane is a matter of police investigation,” said BSF Inspector General G S Shekhawat.

Wabang Jamir, the Superintendent of Police, Kutch-Bhuj, who heads the JIC, said: “We come across such cases very often. In fact, there was a Bangladeshi national, who was apprehended by the BSF while trying to sneak into Pakistan. This man not only pretended insanity but also acted deaf and dumb for several days. He finally broke down and confessed that it was a gimmick to dupe us.”