Mrinal Hazarika being brought to the chief judicial magistrate’s court in Guwahati on Wednesday. Picture by Eastern Projections

Guwahati, June 7: Mrinal Hazarika, commander of the Ulfa’s crack 28 battalion, today said his arrest would not be an impediment in the peace process if the Centre was sincere about taking the talks to its logical conclusion.

Bengal police arrested Hazarika and five more members of the banned group in Siliguri recently.

The rebel leader’s comments came a day after the People’s Consultative Group, constituted by the militant outfit to do the spade work for the peace parleys, demanded that jailed executive members of the Ulfa be released before the next round of talks.

A 30-member team of West Bengal police brought Hazarika and his associates ? Dulal Saikia, Bulen Prasad, Dipak Tamang, Bijoy Kalita and Subrata Pal ? this afternoon and handed them over to their Assam counterparts after producing them before the chief judicial magistrate’s court here.

Hazarika told reporters who had gathered at the court premises that Ulfa was very sincere about the ongoing peace process.

“A breakthrough is possible if the Centre is sincere in resolving the Indo-Assam problem,” the Ulfa commander said.

He said his arrest would in no way hamper the process primarily because he had no role to play in the parleys. “There are senior leaders who will participate in the talks.”

Three years after masterminding the Independence Day blast in Dhemaji, Hazarika described the incident in which several schoolchildren died as an “accident”. He said Ulfa never intended to make children its targets. He also admitted that the blast dented the image of the outfit.

The Ulfa leader, however, refuted the charge that he was in Siliguri on his way back from Nepal after meeting Maoist rebels. He claimed to have gone to the North Bengal town for treatment of an ailment.

The rebel leader and his associates were remanded in police custody for 10 instead of the 15 days that were sought by the counsel. A teenage relative of the Ulfa commander, Jagat Baruah (17), was sent to a juvenile home in Siliguri for trial under the Juvenile Justice Act.

Police said Hazarika’s interrogation was likely to yield valuable information about Ulfa’s extortion campaign in the three Upper Assam districts of Tinsukia, Dibrugarh and Jorhat.