JOIN USA joint operation team of the Indian Army, the Assam Police and other Central forces, based on intelligence input on Monday, nabbed Sumanta Basumatary, a top leader of the Songbijit faction of the National Democratic Front of Bodoland (NDFB).
This is being considered big catch in Bodoland ever since a major crackdown against the NDFB was launched in lower Assam along the Indo-Bhutan border.
Monday's operation came close on the heels of the June 9 surgical strikes by the Army on militant bases along the Indo-Myanmar border.
It also came after the arrest of four suspected hardcore NDFB cadres in Bengaluru. Sources said the intelligence input leading to his capture came from their arrest.
Sources said Basumatary had fled to Bengaluru, and had only recently returned to the Chirang district of Assam.
According to police sources, the NDFB-S Central Council's joint secretary (home) was apprehended from Tukrajhar in Chirang of Assam BTAD bordering Bhutan.
Known within the outfit as B Sinaihang, Basumatary is a 42nd-batch cadre of the NDFB and is known as one of their most hardcore leaders active in lower Assam. He was supposedly trained in NDFB camps in Bhutan.
His job was to oversee coordination of terrorist activities, internal discipline, media interaction and propaganda.
Basumatary was seen as very close to the new NDFB-S vice-president G Bidai. The Army is on the lookout for Bidai as he is believed to be the brain behind the scaled-up violence in the Bodoland area.
Meanwhile, Army intelligence sources have confirmed to Deccan Herald that a group consisting of the Indian Army, the Assam Police and the Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) is engaged in flushing out NFDB militants from the Manas National Park in Chirang, located about 120 km west of Guwahati.
Part of the Manas National Park falls under Bhutan, and the source said there were apprehensions that the NDFB had once again set up bases in the neighbouring country.
The NDFB-S has been an important constituent of the United National Liberation Front of Western South East Asia—a platform of militants groups of the North-East reportedly based out of Myanmar.