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North East : Ethnic violence in Tripura and Assam |
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Ethnic killings have long been the most deplorable aspect of militancy in this part of the country. Extremist elements who have been fighting with the de jure governments both within and outside their states for over decades, often indulge in subversive activities to achieve their vested interests. The region had been passing through a relative calm since America declared its war on terrorism in September last year as terrorists belonging to various regional groupings here have been lying low for fear of strong action from the State. But last week they again raised their ugly heads and killed at least 30 people in the states of Tripura and Assam.
In the first incident on Jan 13, militants belonging to the National Liberation Front of Tripura killed at least 16 people when they attacked a marketplace in west Tripura.
The incident is a reminder of the dangerous uncertainty in which people in the state live. Not only do the militants strike and kill at will, but the shadow of militancy has also darkened all aspects of life in the state. The killers strike with the avowed objective of forcing Bengalis who constitute 60 per cent of the state’s population, to leave their homes and farms, and of sowing seeds of hatred between Bengalis and tribals. None of the other major insurgent groups in the Northeast such as the National Socialist Council of Nagalim or the United Liberation Front of Asom preaches or practises ethnic killings as either strategy or tactics. The Tripura militants, belonging to either the National Liberation Front of Tripura, which was suspected to have been involved in the January 13 killings, or to the All Tripura Tiger Force, have persistently followed an ethnic cleansing policy. They want to force Bengalis, mostly refugees from erstwhile East Pakistan, now Bangladesh, out of the state where the tribals were once in an overwhelming majority.
Regrettably, the ruling Left Front’s responses to militant strikes, according to observers, lack teeth as well as direction. But for their usual call for state-wide bandhs (work stoppages) and requests to the Centre for more forces, the Marxists in Tripura, in fact, never got over their dilemma as to how to deal with the tribal insurgency. They have dithered to launch an all-out offensive against the killer gangs for fear of alienating tribals who form a large part of their votebank. In the process, they have failed to provide security to both Bengalis and tribals. Their calls to the militants to surrender arms and join the state’s political mainstream have had little effect, particularly on the NLFT, the most organized and well-armed rebel group in the state.
The other ethnic group which is spearheading its ethnic drive against the Bengalis, is the People’s Front which has donned a political guise even when their agenda is to establish their hegemony by openly resorting to violence. This group, which has been actively pursuing the possibility of a tie-up with the Congress for next month’s Lok Sabha bypoll in the state, is using every possible weapon to determine the course of politics in the state.
The ruling Left has once again reiterated that the kind of support it has been pleading for has not been forthcoming from the Union Home Ministry. The latter, in turn, has not exactly been very responsive to the state government’s demands, and therein lies yet another major reason why the extremists seem to be having a revival in Tripura.
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