Police fails to withdraw PSOs from SULFA men

GUWAHATI, January 18: The State police has failed to withdraw personal security officers (PSOs) from as many as 20 surrendered militants in the State in view of the Court directive to maintain status quo in this regard. The Director General of the State Police, H K Deka today informed that total 38 surrendered militants had been provided with PSOs in view of the threat to their lives. However, the State Police recently decided to withdraw PSOs from 20 surrendered ultras as per the suggestion of the review committee. However, the former ultras moved the Court raising objection to withdrawal of PSOs and succeeded in getting stay order from the Court. The police had decided to pull out PSOs from those 20 former ultras basically on three grounds- involvement of some of former ultras in criminal activities, reduced security threat to some of them and misuse of the PSOs by them. Regarding seizure of illegal weapons in possession of former militants in the State, the Police chief informed that several such weapons had been recovered from surrendered militants in the State including seven weapons in the city. He informed that some of the surrendered militants were provided with licensed arms way back in 1991-92 and the State police was planning to review their arm licenses soon. When asked what the police was doing to nab those involved in "secret killing" the DGP said all killings were secret killings until and unless the culprits involved were not identified. He said all the District Superintendents of Police had been asked to make thorough investigation of all such killings till a logical conclusion arrived at. The DGP claimed that police had never hesitated to take legal action against surrendered militants found involved in illegal activities. He informed that 40 former militants were arrested in 1999 while 157 were booked in the year 2000. The State police chief said so far only Rs 2.50 crore had been provided to it to take up rehabilitation of surrendered militants. He informed that at present 1066 surrendered militants were being given training on different trades in State police rehabilitation camps. Such former ultras were being provided with monthly stipend to the maximum of Rs 2000 per month. Regarding spurt in the killings of innocent people including Hindi-speaking people in the State by the ULFA, NDFB and UPDS militants last year, the DGP said the militants who were under tremendous pressure from security forces due to counter insurgency operation under Unified Command structure since January 1997, chose to go for mindless killings of innocent people last year to make their presence felt and thereby terrorise the common people. Total 412 civilians killed by the ultras last year as against 179 killed in 1999.