AGARTALA, May 26 ? Central Government has extended a financial help of Rs 10.99 crore in the last financial year for the displaced Reang refugees presently sheltered in six camps at Kanchanpur.
The Reangs had come to North Tripura from adjacent Mizoram following fierce ethnic conflict between the Bru (Reang) and Lushai (Mizo) communities in October 1997. The exodus from Mizoram began on the night of October 15 and in phases the Reangs under constant threat and persecution from the majority community poured in the North district.
Several rounds of talks among the representatives of displaced Reangs, Mizoram Government and Tripura Government in presence of Central Government officials to take them back came a croppers as for obvious reluctance shown by Aizawl. While the Zoramthanga government first demanded that the armed outfit BNLF should eschew violence as pre-condition for the repatriation, later it contradicted the Tripura Government?s number of the refugees originally belonging to Mizoram. Aizawl says there are at most 16,000 Reangs who were its subject while the Tripura Government puts the figure at double 31,000 plus.
Only recently a Ministry of Home Affairs officials visited Kanchanpur to ascertain in the actual figure of the refugees in the camps. The North Tripura district also undertook a head count and now the official sources in Agartala stands by its previous figure of 31,000.
It seems that the Central Government is also well aware of the Mizoram Government?s intention and sanctioned Rs 1 crore for construction of new dwellings for the refugees.
It may be mentioned here that Reangs in the camps are passing their days in total uncertainty. While their children are growing up bereft of any education, poverty stalks every family in the camps. Worst is when dry spell sets in and malaria, gastro entities, diarrhoea, hepatitis, measles take epidemic turn claiming several lives in the camps.