Twelve more militants of the National Democratic Front of Boroland (Songbijit) were arrested and a huge cache of arms and ammunition recovered on Sunday by a joint team of the Assam Police, the Sasashtra Seema Bal and the Central Reserve Police Force from three places in forests adjoining the Manas National Park in Chirang district of the Bodoland Territorial Area District (BTAD).
The arrested included a member of the outfit’s central council, a self-styled deputy commander, a self-styled platoon commander and one second-in-command.
Inspector-General of Police (BTAD) L.R. Bisnoi, who led the operation that began on Saturday night, told The Hindu that four AK-56 rifles, four 9 mm pistol, one 7.65 mm pistol, one .303 rifle, one .315 rifle, 12 magazines, four hand grenades and 784 rounds of ammunition were recovered from them.
Mr. Bisnoi said that in the operation stepped up after the December 23 massacre of 63 Adivasis by the outfit in Sonitpur and Kokrajhar districts, 39 NDFB (S) militants had been arrested so far.
A self-styled commander of the outfit’s ‘Kokrajhar Platoon’ B. Jwblang was killed in an encounter on Saturday. Fifteen rifles including 10 AK series rifles, 12 pistols, 25 hand grenades, 8 kg of explosives and 1285 rounds of ammunition were recovered.
