Insurgency / Tripura

Agartala, Feb. 22: A week after the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) roped in the Indigenous Nationalist Party of Tripura (INPT) as coalition partner in the Northeast, New Delhi is toying with the idea of persuading one faction of the National Liberation Front of Tripura (NLFT) to lay down arms.

The Centre was optimistic that INPT president and former insurgent leader Bijay Kumar Hrangkhawal would be able to convince the NLFT (Biswamohan group) to start a dialogue and surrender en masse.

The INPT team that signed the coalition deal has assured the BJP leadership that the tribal party would...

Agartala, Feb. 16: The BJP in Tripura is on the verge of a split following the inclusion of tribal-based Indigenous Nationalist Party of Tripura (INPT) in the NDA. State BJP president Ranajay Deb had firmly opposed BJP?s electoral alliance with INPT, citing the party?s alleged links with the banned NLFT militants.

However, the INPT leadership approached Trinamul chief Mamata Banerjee in Calcutta and sought an appointment with BJP general secretary Pyarelal Khandelwal in Delhi.

Despite grave reservations expressed by the state BJP president, who was also present in Delhi at that time, BJP...

New Delhi, Feb. 8: Back from another peacemaking mission to Bangkok, Mizoram chief minister Zoramthanga said leaders of as many as three militant groups of the Northeast were expected to visit New Delhi within a month to begin negotiations with the Centre.

The militant leader-turned-politician met leaders of the National Socialist Council of Nagalim (Isak-Muivah) and a couple of other groups during his visit to the Thailand capital. He undertook the mission at the behest of Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee.

Zoramthanga said he held ?extensive? discussions with the NSCN (I-M) leadership on...

AIZAWL, Feb 2 ? The 10th round of talks between the Mizoram Government and the Tripura-based underground Bru National Liberation Front (BNLF) might run into rough weather even as both the sides expressed optimism that they would settle the Bru problem this time around.

An official, who is involved in the negotiations, told PTI on condition of anonymity that the State Government was having serious doubts that the agreement to be made with the BNLF would end the Bru insurgency against Mizoram.

?We doubt that the BNLF would be able to rein in Bru underground splinter groups like tha Bru National...

AGARTALA, Feb 1 ? Bijoy Laxmi Sinha, wife of assassinated Health Minister Bimal Sinha repeatedly broke down while deposing before the court of District Session Judge B K Goswami.

Bimal Sinha, considered to be the most popular minister of the Fourth Left Front government and his younger brother Bidyut Debbarma were shot dead by NLFT militants at Abhanga area in Kamalpur subdivision in Dhalai district on March 31, 1998. The minister had gone to Abhanga for negotiating with the militants on the release of their another Bikram. While Bimal Sinha and Bidyut Sinha were standing on the edge of...

Agartala, Jan. 19: More than 300 people have been rotting in the jails of Tripura because an amendment to the Criminal Procedure Code (CrPC) made by the state government, extending the duration of remand for undertrials, ceased to have effect from October 31.

While many judges have been refusing police plea for remand beyond the normal period sanctioned by the Indian Penal Code (IPC), others continue to send arrested people to jail remand for 120 or 180 days.

According to sources, on May 26 last year, the state government tabled an amendment of clause 439-A of the Criminal Procedure Code...

Agartala, Jan. 15: Bangladesh Rifles jawans have directed militant commanders to abandon their bases and take shelter in rented houses in residential areas. Reports from across the border said over the past month, militants have deserted their camps in Sylhet, Maulvi Bazar and Habiganj districts of Bangladesh, bordering North Tripura, Dhalai district and Khowai and Sadar (north) subdivisions of West Tripura district.

Official sources from North Tripura said a camp at Kukijhuri in Sylhet district adjacent to Kumarghat in North Tripura had been burnt down after the militants left.

?The camp...

Silchar, Jan. 14: The militant Bru National Liberation Front (BNLF) has indicated it is no longer averse to accepting the Mizoram government?s condition that all members of the outfit must lay down weapons before a peace accord is signed. If the BNLF says yes, it will be the second such concession by the Bru group in the past two years.

The militants first gave up the demand for an autonomous district council to administer the Bru-dominated areas of northwest Mizoram. They instead settled for a development council based on the model of limited autonomy, which was granted to the Hmar tribe in...

Agartala, Dec. 29: The banned National Liberation Front of Tripura (NLFT) has resorted to the fake currency business after exhausting all sources of earning. Three groups of militants are currently moving in South and North Tripura and Dhalai districts of the state with fake currencies in the denomination of Rs 500 and Rs 1,000, official sources here said.

The top brass of the outfit, based in the Chittagong Hill Tracts of Bangladesh, has directed the NLFT activists and their overground agents to fetch genuine currencies worth Rs 40,000 in exchange of Rs 1 lakh fake currencies, the sources...

AGARTALA, Dec 27 ? Boosted by Bhutan?s flush out campaign against the Indian militants from its soil Tripura Assembly also unanimously appealed Bangladesh to follow suit. A resolution has been passed in the Tripura House that was deliberating on a Private Member?s resolution on Friday last. The resolution appeals New Delhi to persuade Dhaka to chase out the Indian militants who are presently holed up in that country. Chief Minister Manik Sarkar informed the House that there were at least 50 camps of the Tripura militants in the neighbouring country but at the same he clarified that never the...