Nagaon, Nov. 26: Two employees of a road construction company engaged in the East-West Corridor project in Assam's Dima Hasao district have been kidnapped by suspected militants from a remote project site.

The incident occurred on November 21, but police made the matter public today for security reasons.

The two employees, Mantosh Barman and Amarjit Rai, work for NKC Projects Pvt Ltd, which has been engaged at the site in Mahur area of Dima Hasao since 2012. Mahur is 45km from the district headquarters, Haflong, and about 307km from Guwahati.

Barman, who works as supervisor for the company, hails from Dhubri district. while Rai is an excavator operator. Rai is from Charan district of Bihar.

An FIR lodged by company HRD manager K.C. Tiwari with Mahur police on November 22, states: "The two, along with 20 other company workers, were in the Champijang area near Mahur. The group of armed militants kidnapped three of them from the site. Of the three, Munmun (another employee) was released by the group later."

Mahur police station officer-in-charge Sanjib Terang said, "On the basis of initial reports, we suspect the hands of NSCN (Khaplang) militants in the kidnapping but we are not yet sure about the group responsible for it."

He said local police, along with Assam Rifles, were conducting combing operations in the area.

Dima Hasao deputy commissioner Manoj Kumar said the police and security forces were continuing operations to rescue the two.

"Some topographical problems stand in the way of search operation. However, the hunt is fully on."

This is the second abduction in the hill district in the last seven months.

In May, militants had abducted relatives of two Congress leaders from two different locations of Dima Hasao. Of the two, Jibonn Kemprai, brother of former district Congress president Mahendra Kemprai, is still untraced.

Mahur, closest to the inter-state border, is known as a corridor for militants who cross from and to neighbouring Nagaland and Manipur.

Altogether six companies are working on the 162km Lumding-Silchar stretch of the East-West Corridor. The project was launched in 2007 but law and order trouble, coupled with topographical problem, stand in the way of timely implementation of the project.

A source in the National Highways Authority of India said no work has been done on a 55km stretch while 80 per cent progress has been achieved in the remaining part.

"We have as many as 500 employees and all are in our Burabapu camp near Mahur town. After the abduction of the two employees, work has been temporarily stopped," said NKC Ltd employee Prabin Jha over telephone.