BNLF chief escapes from NLFT's clutches

AIZAWL, February 18: It could beat even a Bollywood pot-boiler for its thrilling suspense. Executing the daring plan, which could have risked those who were involved, president of the underground Bru National Liberation Front (BNLF) Suryamani Reang and his deputy escaped from deep inside Bangladesh where the National Liberation Front of Twipra (NLFT) was allegedly keeping them hostage since July, 2000. It is still unknown how the two managed to escape from the heavily-guarded NLFT camp, but authoritative sources claimed that the two made good their plan with the help of two sentries of Reang origin, reports UNI. After their escape recently, the two reached Khantlang on the Tripura-Bangladesh border and surrendered before the security forces along with the two sentries who had helped them engineer their daring plan. The surrendered insurgents are said to be in the custody of the security forces somewhere in Tripura. On July 9 last year the NLFT had allegedly attacked a BNLF camp inside Bangladesh and killed ten of its cadres. While returning, they had taken about 15 BNLF men, including its president and the second-in-command, captive. Sources claimed that while the others were let off, the two top shots of the group were kept hostage. Though several theories have come up regarding the attack, there was no confirmed report to suggest the actual reason behind the NLFT's attack on the BNLF camp.