Most accounts of LTTE guerrillas are based on impressions others have of them. LTTE fighters may speak if reporters bump into them on the battlefield. But that is very rare. In February and April this year, around 10 Tigers were arrested off Tamil Nadu and are now in prison. Indian officials who interacted with them were impressed by their commitment to the Tamil Eelam cause, however utopian it might seem to others. They also came out as men who knew what they were fighting for and why and as humans with normal feelings of hurt, pride and agony. Their remarks give valuable insight into the LTTE.

One of the two Black Sea Tigers - members of the LTTE naval wing's suicide squad - arrested in February tried to commit suicide by biting a cyanide pill when the Indian Coast Guard confronted them. Other LTTE cadres stopped him just in time. The Tigers were to say later that suicides were not being encouraged now because of a serious shortage of experienced fighters. Replacing a battle-hardened and tested guerrilla would be very difficult.

Their first encounter with the Indian Coast Guard, which patrols the sea dividing India and Sri Lanka, was an unpleasant one. The Coast Guard personnel thrashed the LTTE members for entering Indian waters. An elderly man among the LTTE crew who was a cook was forced to sit on the hot deck. One officer thrust a pistol into the mouth of one guerrilla while another addressed them derisively.

One LTTE prisoner said later that they could have shot down the entire lot of Coast Guard personnel. "But our leadership has instructed us that we should not do anything that harms Indian interests," he said. In an apparent reference to the 1991 assassination of Rajiv Gandhi, he added: "We have done this once, we don't want to do it again."

The Tigers did not regret the assassination of Gandhi but admitted it had caused them enormous problems. They dubbed Gandhi a "Hindi kaaran" (Hindi speaking person) and Indian troops sent to Sri Lanka in 1987-90 also as "Hindi speakers".

The Black Sea Tigers looked a tough lot and every inch capable leaders. They were always alert while in Indian custody. Their eyes never rested in one place, scanning each and every Indian in the interrogation room.

One Sea Tiger explained how tough the LTTE training was. In no time following his enlistment, both his arms had deep gashes, caused by the concertina wire he had to crawl under repeatedly. He also became an adept swimmer and got trained as a frogman too, enabling him to stay under water for a long time. When his trainers were impressed, he became a Black Sea Tiger.

The Tigers were contemptuous of the Tamil Nadu policemen guarding them - and told the startled officers that the men needed better training! One prisoner pointed out flaws in the way the policemen held their guns, the way they stood, and the way they chatted on mobiles and with one another when they were to focus all attention on their prisoners.

One of the Black Sea Tigers related he was once sent on a suicide mission. But it failed because the mechanism to trigger the explosives did not go off. The man tried again and again to activate it but eventually returned to shore. Asked what happened to the person who designed the explosive laden boat, he replied: "He was torn to pieces!" (LTTE does not accept failures.)

Indian officials queried them about the LTTE ideology. One of the prisoners, a school dropout with an unhappy childhood, replied: "We don't believe in theory, we believe in action."

The Sea Tigers maintained that the LTTE military wing was very effective. They added that all cadres were devoted to Velupillai Prabhakaran and believed that an independent Tamil Eelam was the only answer to Tamil problems in Sri Lanka. "The Sinhalese will never accept us as equals. We can never live with them."

What if Prabhakaran were to die one day? One prisoner answered without blinking: "In that case the only way out would be to commit suicide en masse. There will be no other option."