People's Democracy

HOW the tribal extremists and non-tribal communal miscreants are preparing for the next assembly elections in Tripura has recently come to light with the arrest of some students and youth from both the communities.

The state police arrested 8 tribal students from Amarpur subdivision of South Tripura district in the last week of the last month. They were coming to Agartala from the border areas. After long interrogation by the police, they confessed that they were part of 63-strong batch of students who were taken inside Bangladesh by some leaders of the Indigenous Peoples Front of Tripura (IPFT). All of them were students of either the Tripura Engineering College or of degree colleges in and around Agartala.

Their story ran like this. Two IPFT members of the Tripura Tribal Areas Autonomous District Council (ADC) had asked them to assemble at the ADC headquarters, Khumulwang, in the name of sending them to Shillong (the capital of Meghalaya) for training in "cultural activities." But then they were sent to Bangladesh in an ADC vehicle in the last week of August when the election campaign in Bangladesh was in full swing. There these 63 students were imparted training in arms and explosives by the NLFT extremists at Khagrachhari in Chittagong hills district. After a month of arms training, the NLFT gang leaders sent them back, asking them to follow the instructions that would come later. It was the first time that such a large number of college students from urban areas were imparted arms training by the NLFT, a banned organisation. Eight of these very students were arrested inside Tripura after they had crossed the Bangladesh border. Subsequently, the police arrested two more. The police have already registered a conspiracy case and are thoroughly investigating the whole affair.

In another incident last month, one non-tribal youth activist of the United Bengali Liberation Force (UBLF) was caught red-handed at Agartala while he was lobbing a bomb inside the shop of a non-tribal businessman. On police interrogation, he revealed that leaders of the Ananda Marg-led Amara Bangalee provided had explosives to some youth and instructed them to launch attacka. Only a day earlier, UBLF miscreants had hurled explosives on one passenger vehicle near Teliamura, killing 3 innocent tribal passengers and injuring 8 others. On the basis of this information, the police arrested some hardcore UBLF miscreants and recovered from them firearms and explosives including a country-made cannon.

The Tripura state committee of the CPI(M) has expressed serious concern over these revelations and demanded strong action against those who are sponsoring the extremists and communal miscreants. (INN)