Police foil arson attempt in Tura
TURA: Following a shutdown of the mobile internet services across the state to contain the anti-CAB protests that erupted all over, the situation in the Garo Hills region has remained by and large peaceful barring sporadic cases of arson attempt and stone pelting by miscreants on Friday night.
Although there has been no major spike in protests during the last 24 hours in the five districts of Garo Hills, except for the burning of effigies of the state and central leaders, namely that of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Home Minister Amit Shah, Tura MP Agatha Sangma and Chief Minister Conrad Sangma, anti-social elements have been making attempts to create trouble.
On Friday night, unidentified miscreants once again tried to set on fire the same truck parked outside the FCI godown at Dakopgre locality of Tura town and one abandoned van kept in a mechanical garage.
Police patrol parties quickly arrived on the scene and doused the flames to contain the damage.
A police party out on patrol duty late Friday night was targeted by stone throwers in the reserve gittim areas of the town, just below the Tura civil hospital, prompting police to deploy additional forces in the vulnerable areas of the town.
The security forces have been boosted by the arrival of additional central paramilitary forces dispatched by the centre to Garo Hills and the rest of the state.
To check the spread of fake news and rumours, the government has extended the internet shutdown in the state and Garo Hills for another 48 hours, beginning Saturday night.
In the light of the situation spiralling out of control in Shillong and other parts of the state, internet was snapped on Friday evening across Meghalaya for 48 hours.
“We are keeping a tight vigil with both magistrates and police officers moving all over town even at night. The situation is under control,” said West Garo Hills Deputy Comissioner Ram Singh while speaking to The Shillong Times on Saturday evening in Tura.
On the depleting fuel reserves in the region with petrol stations running dry, the deputy commissioner assured that fresh stock would soon arrive.
District Superintendent of Police MGR Kumar told this scribe that coordinated efforts have been made with his counterpart in Goalpara district of Assam for police to excort the fuel tankers to the region.
Meanwhile, deputy commissioner Ram Singh also informed that confidence building measures are being taken up by the district administration with the various locality leaders in view of the upcoming Christmas celebrations.
The Tura Winter Festival and the celebration of 150 years of the town, scheduled to begin from December 16, have been postponed to next year in view of the current situation.
Tura was due to hold a colorful and spectacular celebration of its 150 years this week which was to include a night of music, traditional games, a Songkristan competition among others.
“We are making efforts to try and organise the Songkristan competition on December 18 and 19. For this and other events we are holding a meeting with locality and community leaders on Monday afternoon in the DC office,” informed Ram Singh.
He also said that a pre-Christmas cleaning drive will be organised across all the localities of Tura sometime next week.