Tripura

  Govt. Offers Militants Chance To Surrender

  In accordance with the top priority the Left Front governments have been according to peace and prosperity in Tripura, the recently formed fifth Left Front government has once again held out an olive branch to the misguided militants. It will be noted that militancy has taken a heavy toll on the pro-people programmes of the preceding Left Front governments in this backward, landlocked state.

  Meeting on March 13, the fifth Left Front cabinet gave a fervent call, without any precondition whatsoever, to the misguided militants to return to the mainstream and duly participate in the ongoing development process that the Left Front government intends to carry on at any cost.

Apart from the cabinet decisions, chief minister Manik Sarkar clarified his government’s stand on various issues yesterday, at a press conference held in the Civil Secretariat. The fifth Left Front government’s call to the misguided militant is to open a new leaf in their lives and is in keeping with the third and fourth Left Front governments’ similar calls. The latter had evoked favourable responses from numerous extremists, some of whom have been rehabilitated, and others are in the process of being rehabilitated, under a scheme of the government of India. The state government is eager to go an extra mile towards a lasting solution of the insurgency problem, and that is why it has included some other facilities to those offered by the government of India’s scheme, Sarkar added.

Sarkar also said the state government would actively consider withdrawal of charges against the surrendered extremists, other than those pertaining to atrocities on women. The state government would welcome any initiative or negotiation on the part of the centre, or at personal or organisational level, political, apolitical or religious, for assistance and cooperation towards returning the misguided militants to the mainstream, he affirmed.

The olive branch held out to the misguided militants to give them a chance to put their past behind, by no means compromises the state government’s concern for public security. Sarkar informed newsmen that Special Police Officers (SPOs) have resumed their task of assisting the security forces, a task that was suspended during the run-up to the February 26 assembly polls at the Election Commission’s order. A section of the security forces dispatched to the state during the poll process, would stay on to look after public security, he added.

The March 13 meeting of the fifth Left Front cabinet took one more vital decision for healing the scars of the pre-poll and post-poll violence in Tripura, for which a nefarious nexus between militants and miscreants have mostly been responsible. Sarkar informed newsmen that as the state government’s assistance to those affected since the announcement of the poll schedule, the next of the kin of those killed will be provided a government job if suitable or paid Rs 1.25 lakh. Similarly, the injured will be provided full treatment at government cost. The families whose houses or shops have been arsoned, will be provided financial assistance upto Rs 2000 on the basis of the subdivisional magistrates’ reports, irrespective of political affiliations. 

One will note that as many as 35 people, all of them CPI(M) activists and supporters, were killed by the outlawed NLFT extremists, the underground wing of the INPT that is the Congress party’s electoral ally, since the announcement of poll schedule till the polls on February 26. These killings were part of a heinous campaign of terror let loose by the Congress-INPT combine to hijack the state assembly polls. Subsequently, as part of the alliance’s vengeful violence after its electoral route and a massive mandate for the Left Front, two people have been killed to date and several others injured. In addition, several houses had been set aflame and several people driven away from their hearth and home by NLFT militants and INPT’s and Congress party’s musclemen statewide. (INN)