JOIN USTwo violent attacks within a week shook Assam’s fragile peace and alerted the security forces ahead of the Independence Day celebrations in the state.
Suspected NDFC(S) militants last week attacked a market in Kokrajhar district and killed 13 people, while ULFA(I) terrorists killed two people and injured six others on Friday evening in Tinsukia district.
The incidents, coming as they do when the state is on a high alert ahead of the I-Day celebrations, have rattled the security forces.
Protesters blockaded the highway in Tinsukia and refused to perform the last rites of the two killed in the indiscriminate firing by the militants, demanding the visits of Chief Minister Sarbananda Sonowal and Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh.
Protesters have called for a bandh in Philobari in Tinsukia district, where the militant attack took place. Assam Assembly held a discussion on the attacks, while Sonowal rushed his ministers Atul Bora and Pallab Lochan Das to the area, sources said.
Meanwhile, a police officer was killed and another injured in a scuffle that broke out among security men in Karbi Anglong district due to a firing incident on account of ‘mistaken identity’, Assam police sources added.