Silchar, Sept. 3: The unified command for counter-insurgency operations in Assam today called out the army in the twin districts of Cachar and N.C. Hills in a bid to tame the Dima Halam Daoga (DHD), which had torched eight trucks and damaged 19 vehicles at a stone quarry on Sunday.
An official source said columns of the 18 Jat Regiment had joined the police and CRPF in the search for the militants involved in the incident two days ago.
“Troops have fanned out to Doyabasti, Thapabasti and Chaltacherra. We have received news about the arrest of a suspected DHD activist, Kabu Barman, at Thaligram village in Udarbond block,” he added.
A group of seven militants, all dressed in olive-green fatigues, had raided the Madhura stone quarry on the Cachar-N.C. Hills border and set fire to a row of trucks parked there. Eight of the vehicles were charred, while 19 were partially damaged.
The attack is seen as a warning to truckers not to rebuff the DHD’s demand for “taxes”. The outfit had last year torched six trucks at the same stone quarry.
Intelligence sources said the Nunisa faction of the DHD was involved in Sunday’s incident as well as the abduction of Harshika, the two-and-a-half-year-old daughter of a Cachar-based tea executive.
The toddler, who spent 75 days in captivity, was reunited with her family in Guwahati on August 22.
The police claimed to have secured Harshika’s release from her abductors — “a rag-tag band of Kuki and Khasi militants” — through their contacts in the DHD.
However, the army believes that it was the Dimasa outfit that masterminded the abduction.
The abductors had reportedly demanded Rs 1.5 crore in exchange for Harshika, but her father denied paying ransom.
The girl had been kidnapped from her father’s bungalow on June 7. The abductors, all armed, were wearing masks.
Sources said the abductors had contacted Benoy Bhasin, chief executive of Jayshree Tea and Industries Ltd, to demand jobs for Dimasa tribals in the company’s gardens in Cachar.
Harshika’s father, Sunil Sarawat, is an assistant manager at Kaline tea estate, owned by the Birlas.
