Shah steps in after six Assam cops killed in border clash with Mizoram

Six officers of the Assam Police were killed in clashes at the border with Mizoram, Chief Minister Himanta Sarma said on Monday after another bout of violence in the volatile area. Home Minister Amit Shah has spoken to Chief Ministers of both states.

Expressing condolences, Sarma wrote on Twitter, “I am deeply pained to inform that six brave jawans of Assam Police have sacrificed their lives while defending constitutional boundary of our state at the Assam-Mizoram border. My heartfelt condolences to the bereaved families.”

The border dispute between Assam and Mizoram seems to have been resolved after Union Home Minister Amit Shah on Monday spoke to Chief Ministers of both states asking them to resolve the crisis, sources said.

A war of words ensued between Mizoram Chief Minister Zoramthanga and his counterpart from neighbouring Assam Himanta Biswa Sarma as the former urged Home Minister Shah to look into the matter and immediately end this crisis.

During his two-day trip to Meghalaya last weekend, Shah had held a closed-door meeting with chief ministers of the northeast states. A clipping shared by Zoramthanga on Twitter showed police trying to stop a clash among men armed with sticks.

In reply to the tweet, Assam Police said miscreants from Mizoram were indulging in stone-pelting and attacking Assam government officials stationed at Lailapur to protect Assam’s land from encroachment.

In reply, Sarma shared a clipping and said a superintendent of police from Mizoram was asking Assam’s officials to withdraw from their post, failing which civilians from the neighbouring state would not stop the violence. He too sought immediate intervention of Shah and the Prime Minister’s Office (PMO).

Meanwhile, according to sources, Home Minister Amit Shah on Monday spoke to Chief Ministers of both states asking them to resolve the crisis. The two chief ministers have agreed on Shah’s request and the police forces of both states have now returned back from the disputed site, sources said.

At the chief ministers’ meeting, chaired by Shah in Shillong on Saturday, Zoramthanga said the area claimed by the latter has been used by people from Mizoram for over 100 years.

“The border disputes are a legacy of the colonial era that the present government inherited from its predecessor which has been left unresolved at the time of the formation of states like Nagaland, Meghalaya, Arunachal Pradesh and Mizoram,” he said.

“The large tract of areas claimed by Assam to be within its constitutional boundary has been used for collection of forest producers and for shifting and settled cultivation for the past 100 plus years by the people of Mizoram, and that Assam started claiming these areas only fairly recently due to population pressure apparently caused by the large-scale influx of migrants from outside Barak valley,” he said.

WITH ANI INPUTS