GUWAHATI, March 8— Banned ULFA separatists today carried out a series of attacks setting on fire a 5000 KL petrol tank at the famous Digboi Refinery, blasting a gas pipeline nearby, attacking a police post and a commando barrack and firing at a Bihari settlement killing two persons and injuring six others, reports PTI. The two deaths occurred in Goalpara district where a police outpost was attacked. There was no casualty in the explosions in Tinsukia and Dibrugarh districts.
Self-styled Commander-in-Chief of ULFA Paresh Baruah rang up media houses in Guwahati this morning to claim responsibility for the attacks on the IOC’s petrol storage tank near Digboi refinery in Tinsukia district and the damage to the gas pipeline in Dibrugarh district. Ron Duarah with Suresh Pathak adds from Dibrugarh: A rocket propelled grenade attack at the new tank farm of the Digboi refinery has caused a blaze which is yet to be completely doused. Petroleum experts at Digboi told The Assam Tribune that the fire which is razing from tank No. 559 is “expected to be fully extinguished” by early Sunday morning.
The new tank farm is located by the national highway leading to Margherita, and has 13 tanks in all, with different storage capacities. The tanks contain finished products like petrol, high speed diesel, low speed diesel, furnace oil, naphtha and kerosene. All the tanks have an aggregate capacity of storing 35000 kilolitres. On Friday evening, the tank farm had 27000 kilolitres of finished products, ready for dispatch by tankers to various destinations.
At about 1-20 this morning, suspected ULFA militants blew up two gas pipelines just outside the Kathalguri oil and gas collecting station, under Duliajan police station in the Dibrugarh district. Firefighters rushed to the spot in time and put out the fire within half an hour. Later this morning, police found 200 metres of electrical flexible wires and a few rechargeable cells from the spot of the explosion. The wires led to a hut in the nearby village of Tamulkhat. The police believe the explosion was controlled from the hut.
Calling up local media houses in Guwahati, Baruah said, ‘my boys blew up the oil tank and gas pipeline. They have orders to continue such targeting in the coming days’. The technicians from Oil India Limited have repaired the damaged pipeline this afternoon, and gas flow to and from the station has been restored. Fortunately, the fire could not spread to the oil collection station campus, where there is a big stock of crude oil. The fire inside the station could have been catastrophic.
Due to decreasing oil and gas production at the area, the security measures at the Kathalguri OCS was relaxed a little some time ago, and this may have encouraged the militants to strike there, according to a senior police official here. He added that security measures have been beefed up to protect all oil installations in the State following an information that the ULFA may strike again, to coincide with its “Sainik Divas” on March 16. It is now theorized that the banned outfit has preponed its planned subversive activities to circumvent the stepped-up security measures.
Meanwhile, at Digboi, locals said they heard the loud explosions around midnight and thought someone was rejoicing at India’s march to victory over Kenya at the World Cup cricket match. It was only when the people realised that the explosion was far louder than any firecracker that they ventured out of their homes to see a huge ball of fire above the new tanks farm area. The explosions also shook the township, like an earthquake does.
To prevent damage to humans, an area of 500 metres around the tank farm was evacuated last night itself, even as firefighters did their best to stop the inferno from spreading to the other tanks of the farm. The firefighters were from different agencies like the defence forces, railways, OIL, ONGC, NRL, and the State fire services, apart from IOC (AOD)’s own.
A PTI report from Guwahati adds: Petroleum and Natural Gas Minister Ram Naik said in Kolkata that the blaze was under control and extra foam required for containing it had been sent from Guwahati. The fire could not spread, he said, as the tank which was set ablaze was at a distance from others. Stating that he has received only preliminary reports, the Minister said that he would come to know about the extent of damage after getting full details.
Meanwhile, Petroleum Secretary BK Chaturvedi said the fire at the petrol storage tank at Digboi refinery has been confined to a small area and is likely to be brought under control by tonight.