Militants’ link to SBI official’s abduction not ruled out
From Our Correspondent
TURA: East Garo Hills police appears to have stumbled upon crucial evidence linking the ULFA and a little known Rabha outfit to the abduction of a senior State Bank of India (SBI) official following the arrest of two militants from Mendipather region close to Assam border on Thursday afternoon.
A police Naka checking (vehicle identification and frisking of passengers) that was conducted at Manikganj border led to the arrests. Two motorcycle-borne youth coming towards Manikganj was stopped by security forces who found in their possession a powerful European made 9 MM Browning pistol.
Manikganj is a sensitive region that shares an open border with Garo Hills and Assam. It is also a crucial link road that supplies raw materials to the only cement plant in Garo Hills, Virgo cement at Damas. Dacoits, militants and criminals have made Manikganj a haven for crime.
The two militants who were arrested with the pistol were identified as Lanchu Rabha aka Nehur (22) of the Paresh Barua faction of ULFA hailing from Kokrajhar district. His arrested companion is Lenin Rabha aka Moni (19) who belongs to nearby Miapara village. The two-wheeler, a Platina motorbike (AS 18 B 0690), in which the two militants were riding have been seized by Garo Hills police.
Highly placed police sources have indicated to The Shillong Times that the two arrested militants will be able to shed much light into the entire kidnapping episode of SBI Assistant General Manager VK Gupta.
“Plenty of evidence points to similarities between the arrested duo and the kidnapping of the bank official one of which is the use of motorbikes and pistols which have now been confiscated,” said police.
What Assam police was unable to achieve has evidently been managed by East Garo Hills police. The bank official was kidnapped on the night of February 23 while returning from Mendipather to Goalpara at a place called Chotomatia border village under Krishnai police station.
Assam police have failed to make any headway into the kidnapping and it is only now, one week later, that Garo Hills police made the breakthrough.
The arrest of the two militants will clearly spill the bean on the linkages between the ULFA and the Rabha Viper Army which is said to be one of the most dangerous outfit operating in the Assam-Garo Hills border.
Before Thursday’s success story, no senior ULFA or Rabha Viper militant had been arrested together by security forces from Assam or Meghalaya.