WILLIAMNAGAR: He rarely slept at night frequently changing hideouts and replacing his sentries on duty to prevent police from getting their hands on him in their relentless search for the most wanted militant leader ever in the history of Garo Hills.
It worked for seven long years as Sohan D Shira escaped every raid and attack on his hideout.
That was until police changed their strategy and went for him at his least expected time-daybreak.
They first brought in one of their most decorated counter-insurgency officers and former Williamnagar SP Jerry Fischer K Marak to oversee the operations against Sohan Shira, this week.
Marak, who sets the record for successful counter insurgency operations against the GNLA had time and again come close to nabbing the elusive leader. But each time Sohan managed to give him the slip.
Ever since the attack on NCP candidate Jonathone Sangma who died with three others in an IED blast suspected to have been carried out by the GNLA outfit, Sohan had been on his toes.
“We were missing him narrowly since then because he was changing his hideout twice in one night,” said Marak, the head of the elite SF-10 Commando Force who played a crucial role in the operation to get the militant leader.
Prior to the attack on NCP candidate Jonathone Sangma, police circles had presumed that the GNLA leader was down and out and fleeing from one corner to another in hot pursuit by security forces somewhere in the remote South Garo Hills region bordering West Khasi Hills.
The attack on Jonathone Sangma revealed Sohan’s presence so close to Williamnagar and operations were quickly launched.
Apprehensive of his escape towards the Khasi Hills region, a security dragnet was put in place with information flowing in quickly about his movement from one village to another clearly revealing a pattern.
The rebel group was soon identified moving through Bawegre, Songmagre near the Nangalbibra border region with South Garo Hills, Bangonggre and then Dobu.
At one of the villages along the route, in Rambogre, the GNLA chief had left minutes before the arrival of the commando units.
With history proving police raids on hideouts taking place at the break of dawn, the GNLA chief was on his guard.
But the police had other ideas. With credible information of his presence in the Dobu Bawanggre hills, the raid was given the green light at dawn and Sohan was caught off guard.
His strategy of keeping a little distance from the rest of his group to make the first break in the event of an attack proved to be his Achilles heel.
According to members of the operational team, Sohan was several yards away from his group when an approaching team of SF-10 commandos suddenly came into visual contact with him.
“It was unexpected and everything happened so fast,” said a police official as he narrated what the commandos on the ground relayed back to base.
Sohan had tried in desperate vain to escape by firing a volley of shots from his Heckler and Koch rifle. It would prove to be his undoing.
The return fire from the commandos was unforgiving as the GNLA commander-in-chief slumped to the ground with a portion of his head blown off and multiple bullet wounds to his body.
“We got him!” were the three words that was relayed over to base by the team leader ending Meghalaya police’s longest manhunt for an elusive rebel.
For some he was a hero but for many more he was someone who destroyed families and generations of youth with the power of the gun.
