From Our Correspondent
Agartala: Asserting that the terrorism, communalism and extremism continues to pose a serious threat to the internal security of the country, Chief Minister Manik Sarkar has said the problem of militancy in Tripura is not yet rooted out completely.
During the past few years, Tripura has achieved significant success in bringing down extremist activities across the state but this problem is not yet completely uprooted, he said while speaking at the Chief Ministers’ Conference on internal security at Vigyan Bhawan in Delhi on Wednesday.
“The major extremist group currently operating against the state is NLFT (BM), with strength of about 130-150 members. They have sophisticated weapons and also expertise in handling IEDs”, he said.
Sarkar further the outfit has as many as 19 hideouts in Bangladesh and four of which are located within 10 km of the Indo-Bangla border. “The group has been trying to make fresh recruitments. Reports also indicate that most of the NE insurgent groups, including NLFT (BM) have formed a common platform called United Forum, which may pose a serious threat to all the NE states and to the country as a whole”, he said.
Demanding to provide four additional CAPF battalions and sanctioning two more IR battalions for Tripura, Sarkar urged the Centre to make diplomatic efforts with Bangladesh government in effectively tackling extremists currently having their camps in the neighbouring country.
On the modernization of state police force, Chief Minister requested the Centre to pump more fund to enable Tripura police to effectively meet the challenges that it face. The state has received Rs. 42.77 crore during last three years and of which Rs. 38.89 crore has been spent.
In regard to ensure effective border management, Sarkar laid emphasis on speedy completion of barbed wire fencing work along Indo-Bangla border. “Tripura has 856 km long international border with Bangladesh of which 673 km has been fenced so far. There is need to speed up efforts for fencing the remaining part of the international border”, he said.
Sarkar further stressed need on bringing all-round development in the border areas by developing infrastructures, providing basic amenities to the border people so that insurgents and anti national elements are not able to use unemployed youths for their nefarious activities.