From Our Correspondent
TURA: East Garo Hills Police have busted an armed gang and shot dead a dacoit involved in the attack on Siju-Rongara MLA Rophul S Marak at Gabil Bisa village near Rongmil on Thursday night.
The breakthrough came two days after the incident involving the legislator took place at the same place.
Following the attack on the MLA’s convoy, police personnel from Rongmil anti-dacoity camp located close to the border with North Garo Hills were conducting patrolling duty on Thursday night at around 10:30 PM when they came across a group of armed dacoits committing robbery on a number of coal laden trucks at the same spot where the incident with the MLA’s party had taken place on Tuesday night.
When challenged by the police team, the gang of dacoits armed with pistols and rifles, and dressed in camouflage, opened fire in an attempt to escape following retaliatory fire from the security forces.
In the gun battle one of the dacoits was shot dead while the others fled into the forest.
The dacoit who died in the encounter was identified on Friday morning as one Mamin R Marak hailing from Gabil Bisa village itself.
It was revealed that a handful of young boys from the village and its adjoining areas, in possession of small arms, had been regularly waylaying coal trucks in the dead of night and attacking drivers and robbing them of coal money. On Tuesday night, a similar attempt was made to rob the Siju-Rongara MLA Rophul S Marak while he was passing through the area in a convoy. The dacoits emerged from the jungles in olive green dresses carrying weapons and beckoned the vehicles to halt. When the convoy tried to drive through, the gang opened fire unaware that two armed police security guards were accompanying the legislator.
The two personal security officers (PSOs) of the MLA opened fire from their weapons forcing the dacoits to flee back to the jungle.