From Our Correspondent
TURA: In one of the most shocking retaliatory attacks by militants on a police official, suspected GNLA militants first attacked the parental home of East Garo Hills District Superintendent of Police JFK Marak in Williamnagar town and then laid a trap for his convoy by placing a powerful landmine which was detected at the eleventh hour on Friday afternoon.
The attack on the family premises of the police chief was allegedly in connection with the recent recovery of a huge sum of money from the home of the militant chief of the GNLA. Williamnagar police had raided the home of GNLA army chief Sohan D Shira at Chachatgre village, 2 kms from district headquarters and recovered Rs 22.88 lakh from the ceiling of his house.
Post midnight of Thursday, four armed men suspected to be GNLA militants crossed the river Simsang and penetrated Nokil A’we locality of Williamnagar and headed straight to the residential premises of Marak’s family home.
They entered the compound and opened indiscriminate fire partially damaging the house where the younger sister and family of the police chief resided. Over 17 empty ammunition cases were recovered from the attack scene.
The elderly mother of the police chief was away in Tura at the time of the attack.
Before leaving the scene the armed militants planted a powerful landmine on the side of the main gate leading to the house in expectation that the officer would rush to the scene with his SWAT commandos ultimately ending in a catastrophe with loss of life.
Over concerns about an impending ambush, police commandos walked the extra mile to reach the family home of their police chief leaving behind their vehicles.
As dawn broke, the police chief arrived on the scene and entered his family home totally unaware his convoy had narrowly missed the hidden landmine that had been planted next to the front gate.
An alert commando noticed the trigger device protruding out of the surface and raised an alarm leading to the detection of the powerful landmine at around 3 pm.
Following the detection of the highly explosive device, local residents from the area have been evacuated to avoid any casualty since the bomb disposal unit of the Indian army based in neighbouring Assam is arriving on Saturday to trigger a safe detonation of the device.