TURA: A top engineer overseeing the construction of flood lights along the border fencing with Bangladesh has been kidnapped at gunpoint by a group of suspected Garo militants from Rongara border in South Garo Hills on Friday night, a delayed report said on Monday.
The daring raid by a group of armed rebels on the residential quarters of the National Buildings Construction Corporation limited (NBCCL), a Central-government owned enterprise, engaged in border construction works, has shaken the security apparatus.
Questions are being raised on the ‘vigil’ by the Border Security Force which is tasked with the security of the international border with Bangladesh and on whom the border project teams depend upon for security cover while engaged in their work.
As many as five to six armed men barged into the NBCC housing complex shortly after midnight of Friday and pulled out the workers and engineers from their beds.
They asked for the senior-most engineer A K Srivastava and when told by the junior engineers that he was not present the armed men reportedly threatened to shot unless they disclosed his whereabouts.
The juniors ultimately led them to a rented house, 200 meters from the camp site where the project engineer Srivastava was sound asleep. He was dragged out by the armed men and taken away into the forests.
Shaken by the incident the NBCC staff hurriedly left the site early in the morning not informing the local police and headed out of the district.
They relayed the previous night’s events to their top bosses at the company’s headquarters.
“The NBCC staff did not alert the BSF or the police outpost at Rongara. We came to know about the incident only from our headquarters the next day. Had they alerted us earlier precious time could have been saved and we could have launched operations immediately to cut off the kidnappers,” said district police chief Lakador Syiem.
The identity of the militants involved in the raid is being verified since the group had claimed to be members of an outfit which signed the peace accord recently.
“According to the staff of the company who witnessed the kidnapping, the militants had called themselves as ANVC-B,” said SP Lakador Syiem.
Since Saturday, combing operations have been taking place in the Rongara region to trace the whereabouts of the kidnappers but without success.
