Staff Reporter
DIMAPUR, JUL 19
AT least 400 huts inside four Naga villages/settlements were either torched or razed to the ground in an early morning operation conducted by the Assam police, along the inter-state border belt of Dimapur-Karbi Anglong area.
Saturday’s operation, the most aggressive yet by the Assam police since the border row in its current form has been revived, was carried out at Dikoi, Rilan, Sensolikum and the northern edge of Indisen village.
The two villages of Dikoi and Sensolikum bore the major brunt as all the houses inside these two villagers were either burned or dismantled. In Dikoi alone, the number was projected to be around 200. Not even the church building was spared, the villagers alleged.
In the cases of Rilan and Indisen, few huts constructed by Naga settlers at the outer edge of the villages were burned/dismantled. Gunshots were also exchanged, early in the morning.
Additional Superintendent of Police (Border), Karbi Anglong, Nanda Singh – who led the operation – told newsmen that the eviction drive was to remove “illegal settlers” from the Assam forest reserve. Naga settlers, however, claim that the land belongs to them.
The operation was launched at dawn on Saturday, when a company and another two platoons of Assam police, aided unarmed police personnel, women police and hired laborers swooped down on Naga settlers in Rilan, Sensolikum and Indisen area.
The team to Dikoi, however, could not reach their destination per schedule owing to the “bad roads”, according to the ASP. Subsequently, the evection could start only at 8.30 am, he said.
It was preceded by a 30-minutes exchange of gunfire between the Assam police and the villagers of Dikoi, Singh said. The villagers had used machine guns and grenades to thwart off the Assam police, he claimed. No injuries or casualties were reported.
Meanwhile the Chakesang Welfare Committee of Dikoi Village, in a statement issued today, condemned the action of the Assam police, alleging that the latter had not even spared their church building. It also questioned the inaction of the district administration and police.
