From Our Correspondent
TURA: Friday morning’s police raid on a GNLA camp deep in the jungles of Nengmandalgre, near Ganinggre village, 8 kms from Williamnagar town across Simsang river, has led to the recovery of two powerful improvised explosive devices (IEDs) presumably gifted to the Garo outfit by the Assam based militant organisation ULFA.
Following the successful operation against the GNLA security forces recovered the two explosives along with a binocular set and several number of incriminating documents.
Given that the GNLA is a nascent outfit and previous Garo outfits have had little or no experience with explosives the finger of suspicion lies with the banned ULFA that may have handed the material.
At the time of the operation on the camp there were ULFA militants also holed up with senior GNLA members including “army chief” Sohan D Shira. The long duration of the firefight revealed that the militants were attempting to give adequate time to their leaders to escape before police overpowered them.
Apart from Sohan Shira two other important figures in the outfit Roster Sangma and Savio Marak were also inside the jungle hideout. Security forces have retrieved the police uniform of Savio Marak that was issued to him by Meghalaya police 1st MLP battalion. Roster Sangma, on the otherhand, is a close confidant of Sohan and also doubles as his chief security officer. He was dismissed from police service a couple of years ago on account of poor discipline.
Police are keen to catch Roster Sangma because intelligence reports have surfaced that connect him to the July 2nd killing of a mentally challenged man near the ANVC nodal office in the heart of Williamnagar town. As many as nine bullet wounds were on the body of the deceased civilian showing the inhuman side of those who pulled the trigger.
Following the destruction of the GNLA camp security agencies are breathing a sigh of relief. “We can now give a proper chase since they will be disillusioned and it will take a lot of time for them to regroup and set up another new base,” informed police officials from the district.