Agartala, May 18: Tripura police claim to have got wind of a plan by the banned All-Tripura Tiger Force and a faction of the National Liberation Front of Tripura (NLFT) to drive out Bengali settlers from the state.
Sources in the intelligence wing of the police said the spurt in militant activity in West and North Tripura districts indicated that the NLFT?s Nayanbasi Jamatya faction and the Tiger Force had joined hands again for ?Operation Roukhala (deportation)?.
Jamatya broke away from the NLFT in January 2001 and struck a deal with the Tiger Force. The two groups carried out joint operations in Sadar (north) and Khowai subdivisions before falling out over sharing of the extortion booty, including ?tax? and ransom for the release of abducted persons.
Members of both outfits have since clashed on several occasions, leading to casualties on both sides.
The police said a rapprochement took place in April, when Jamatya and his self-styled lieutenants met their rivals, including Tiger Force president Ranjit Debbarma, at the residence of a Jamait-e-Islami leader in Srimangal town of Bangladesh. The leaders of the two groups decided to jointly launch an offensive against the non-tribal communities, specifically the Bengali settlers.
Jamatya reportedly said that those who had settled in Tripura after October 15 1949 ? that was the year the state became a part of the Indian Union ? would be driven out.
For the state administration, which has repeatedly complained about inadequate availability of paramilitary forces at its disposal, the biggest worry is the Jamatya faction?s nexus with criminals based in Sylhet and Habiganj districts of Bangladesh.
Before he broke away from the NLFT, Jamatya had two wives and nine children. Last year, he married Tahera Bibi, daughter of a dreaded Bangladeshi dacoit called Abu Mia. The militant leader even converted to Islam at the behest of his third wife and her father, the sources said.
The Tiger Force, too, is believed to have forged links with a Habiganj-based criminal gang. A senior police official said some of these criminals were in the group of assailants that massacred 21 people at Simna Colony on May 7.
The site of the massacre is just 45 km from Agartala. The Indo-Bangladesh border and the BSF outpost are half-a-km away. Just across the border, at Satcherri under Habiganj district, is the headquarters of the Tiger Force.