Assam Chief Minister Tarun Gogoi has urged the Central Government to deploy the Sashastra Seema Bal (SSB) as a neutral force in the displaced area belt (DAB) along the Assam-Nagaland border.
Gogoi wrote to Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh over the issue and said that necessary directions may be passed to the SSB authorities for ensuring the deployment along the Assam-Nagaland border, which had witnessed severe violence last month due to attacks by armed miscreants from Nagaland side.
The violence by the armed miscreants had led to killing of over 10 civilians from Assam side and displaced over 10,000 people as the miscreants had burnt several villages in the Assam side of the border.Gogoi’s appeal for deployment assumes significance as the CRPF had been deployed as neutral force along the six sectors of the Assam-Nagaland border since 1979.
However, during the visit of the Union Minister of State for Home, Kiren Rijiju to Assam after the violence, both the Chief Ministers of Assam and Nagaland had raised concern over the efficiency of the CRPF as the neutral force.Gogoi also expressed concern over the fact that some Naga villagers backed by NSCN militants were creating obstruction in the process of rehabilitation of the displaced persons in the area, thus creating a sense of insecurity and panic among the villagers.
Gogoi also mentioned that there is presence of Nagaland Armed Police in some of the villages in the disputed area belt and sought the Union Home Minister to intervene and to make arrangements for withdrawal of the forces from the villages immediately.
“The presence of Nagaland Armed Police has caused panic among the people and they are reluctant to return to their homes. It is necessary that Nagaland Armed Police is immediately withdrawn,” Gogoi said in his letter to Singh.“Delay of the return of the displaced persons to their homes may aggravate the law and order situation in the State. Sooner the people return to their villages, the better it is for maintenance of the law and order situation,” he said.
Although 5,700 inmates, who had taken shelter in the relief camps, have returned to their villages but about 4,167 others are still in the relief camps and reluctant to return to their villages due to the insecurity.