Assam Chief Minister Tarun Gogoi on Tuesday said the recent carnage of tribals by Bodo miltant group NDFB (Songbijit) was a “joint failure” of the State and Centre.
Speaking to journalists, the Chief Minister also criticised the Intelligence Bureau (IB) for ‘leaking’ its information report about the attack, “thereby exposing their own Central government.”
Mr. Gogoi admitted: “There were lapses... I don’t deny it. Let there be a judicial inquiry. I don’t want to blame anyone now.”
“The IB gave us information on December 23 at 3 p.m. that the NDFB(S) would strike and we got information about it before them at noon. I could not take action but our case is: why did the Army, SSB, and paramilitary forces not act when they had the information,” Mr. Gogoi said. Rejecting Mr. Gogoi’s view, the Bharatiya Janata Party’s Assam chief Siddhartha Bhattacharya said: “Law and order is a State subject. The Centre can only give forces to the State but it is the State’s responsibility to deploy them. In this case, the State failed to deploy the forces properly.”
Mr. Gogoi also lashed out at West Bengal for preventing Assamese officials from meeting people at shelter camps.
