Gogoi wants ‘neutral’ SSB in violence-affected villages along Nagaland border

Requesting the union home minister to intervene, Gogoi said the best way to ensure normalcy and smooth return of the displaced villagers was to initiate immediate measures to deploy Sashtra Seema Bal (SSB) as a neutral force in the affected villages along the border. “Necessary suitable directions may be passed to the government of Nagaland and SSB authorities for ensuring early return of the affected families from the relief camps,” Gogoi’s letter to Singh said.

“Delay in the return of the displaced persons to their homes may aggravate the law and order situation in the State. Sooner the people return to their villages, the better it is for maintenance of the law and order situation,” he added.

Earlier, when CM Gogoi reviewed the prevailing law and order situation along the Assam-Nagaland border last evening, state police and home department officials told him that the process of rehabilitation of displaced persons was hindered due to the presence of NAP personnel in some villages.

“Officials informed the chief minister that some Naga villagers backed by NSCN militants were creating obstruction in the process of rehabilitation of the displaced persons, thus creating a sense of insecurity and panic among the villagers,” the official press note issued by the CM’s office said. So far around 5,700 persons who were lodged in relief camps following the violent incidents have returned to their villages while 4,167 were still in the relief camps, it said.

“Rengma villagers threatened”

Meanwhile, the Rengma Naga People’s Council (RNPC) has alleged that eight women of the Rengma Naga community belonging to villages in Karbi Anglong district in Assam were waylaid by suspected Karbi militants at Borsuphon village under Chokihola police station, after which police refused to accept an FIR.

“While the women were subjected to physical harassment for more than two hours at gunpoint and robbed of their valuables including mobile phones, the Officer-in-Charge of Chokihola Police Station refused to take the written complaint as FIR.

The OC objected to the complaint referring to the fact they were harassed at gunpoint, and took the complaint only after they deleted the reference to guns,” a memorandum sent to the Karbi Anglong by the Rengma Naga People’s Council said.

It was in December, last year that several hundred Rengma Naga families were rendered homeless and at least six were killed in violent attack by armed Karbi People’s Liberation Tigers (KPLT) in Karbi Anglong district in Assam.