2014 Assam violence | |
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Part of Insurgency in Northeast India | |
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Location | Assam, India |
Date | 1 May 2014 – 3 May 2014 |
Weapons | AK 47 [1] |
Deaths | 33 and 3 suspects [2] [3] |
Motive | Not voting for Bodos [4] |
From the night of 1 May 2014 until the early morning hours of 3 May a series of attacks occurred on the Bengali Muslims in Assam, a north-eastern state of India. The perpetrator is suspected to be the terrorist group National Democratic Front of Bodoland's Songbijit faction. [3] [5] Speculated to be revenge for not voting for the National Democratic Front in the Lok Sabha elections, [4] the death toll reached 32. [6]
The Bodos are an indigenous community in the Assam state of India. It contributes to about 3% of the state's population of 31 million people. The insurgency in Northeast India is ongoing for decades involving several rebel groups. In 2012, violence between Bodo tribal people and Bengali Muslims resulted in 108 deaths fueled by an Assam Police Constable Mohibur Islam alias Ratul. [7] In India, the Lok Sabha election was being held which would conclude its last phase on 12 May and the results would be declared on 16 May. [2]
Around 07:30 PM IST on 1 May, insurgents raided the Narsingbari village of Baksa district opening fire on a house, killing three women and injuring two others. The attackers had arrived on bicycles. On early hours of 2 May, another group of insurgents opened fire at three houses in Balapara village of Kokrajhar district, killing seven people. On the evening of the same day, another group killed 12 people and burnt down 30 thatched houses near Baksa's Manas National Park. [4]
On 3 May, four suspected insurgents attacked police in the forest near Tezpur. Police fired in retaliation which killed 2 of them while the other two escaped. Police also killed one more suspect in Udalguri district from whom they recovered a revolver and a hand grenade. [2]
Police arrested 22 people along with eight forest guards to investigate their involvement. [2] The Assam government has decided to hand over the probe to National Investigation Agency. [8]
Due to the attack, several Bengali Muslims from Duramari and Dotoma region of Kokrajhar district fled their houses. Bodoland Territorial Council chief Hagrama Mohilary pacified the panicked people and promised them of security. [4] Curfew was clamped in Kokrajhar, Baksa and Chirang districts and shoot-on-sight orders had been issued in Kokrajhar and Baksa. [3]
The Army did flag marches in the sensitive areas of Kokrajhar and Baksa districts. Ten additional companies of Central Reserve Police Force were moved to the two districts. Strong action against the National Democratic Font has been initiated by the home ministry of India. [4]
The Union Home Ministry deployed 43 companies of the Central Armed Police Forces while the Defense Ministry also deployed 15 columns of the Army numbering approximately 1,500 soldiers. [9]
The Chief minister of Assam, Tarun Gogoi reviewed the situation with top government officials. The opposition political parties blamed the Gogoi-led government in failing to protect lives despite intelligence alerts. [3]
The Prime Minister of India, Manmohan Singh condemned the attack and termed it as a cowardly attempt to spread fear and terror. [10]
In a statement, the National Democratic Front of Bodoland (Songbijit) denied their involvement in the attack and claimed it was conspiracy by the state government to create communal friction between Bodos and Muslims. [11] [12]
Relatives of the killed urged the Chief minister Tarun Gogoi to provide affirmation of security for their lives and stalled the last rites for those dead. They also complained of pressure from local authorities to conduct funeral rites for the killed. [13]
The National Democratic Front of Boroland (NDFB) was an armed separatist outfit which sought to obtain a sovereign Boroland for the Bodo people. It is designated as a terrorist organisation by the Government of India.
The Bodoland Territorial Region (BTR) is an autonomous division in Assam, India, and a proposed state in Northeast India. It is made up of five districts on the north bank of the Brahmaputra River below the foothills of Bhutan and Arunachal Pradesh. It is administered by an elected body known as the Bodoland Territorial Council which came into existence under the terms of a peace agreement signed in February 2003 and its autonomy was further extended by an agreement signed in January 2020. The region covers an area of over nine thousand square kilometres and is predominantly inhabited by the Bodo people and other indigenous communities of Assam.
The Insurgency in Northeast India involves multiple separatist militant groups operating in some of India's northeastern states, which are connected to the rest of India by the Siliguri Corridor, a strip of land as narrow as 14.29 miles (23.00 km) wide.
Kokrajhar district is an administrative district in Bodoland Territorial Region of Assam. It is predominantly inhabited by the Boro tribe. The district has its headquarters located at Kokrajhar Town and occupies an area of 3,169.22 km2 (1,223.64 sq mi). It has two civil sub-divisions namely Parbatjhora and Gossaigaon and five revenue circles namely Kokrajhar, Dotma, Bhaoraguri, Gossaigaon and Bagribarilll
The Bodo Liberation Tigers Force, also known as the Bodo Liberation Tigers, was an armed militant group that operated in the Bodo dominated regions of Assam, India. The BLTF was founded on 18 June 1996 by Prem Singh Brahma and Hagrama Mohilary. Hagrama Mohilary was the chief of the outfit.
Hagrama Mohilary is an Indian politician who has served as the first Chief Executive Member of the Bodoland Territorial Council from 2005 to 2020, representing the Deborgaon constituency. He is the chairperson of the Bodoland People's Front and had been the head of Bodoland Territorial Council since its inception in 2003. He won the third General Assembly Elections 2015 and formed his Government for the third time. Mohilary was the chief of the Bodo Liberation Tigers (BLT) before joining the mainstream politics in 2003.
Dhekiajuli is a town and a municipal board in Sonitpur district in the state of Assam, India.
The 2008 Assam bombings occurred on 30 October 2008, before noon in markets in Guwahati city and the surrounding area of western Assam. Reports indicated as many as eighteen bombs went off, causing at least 81 deaths and 470 injuries.
Assam separatist movements refers to a series of multiple insurgent and separatist movements that had been operated in the Northeast Indian state of Assam. The conflict started in the 1970s following tension between the native indigenous Assamese people and the Indian government over alleged neglect, political, social, cultural, economic issues and increased levels of illegal immigration from Bangladesh. The conflict has resulted in the deaths of 12,000 United Liberation Front of Assam (ULFA) militants and 18,000 others.
In July 2012, violence in the Indian state of Assam broke out with riots between indigenous Bodos and immigrant Bengali Muslims in the Bodoland region of North East, India. The first incident was reported to have taken place on 20 July 2012. At least 108 people died and over 400,000 people were displaced into 270 relief camps, after being displaced from almost 400 villages. Eleven people have been reported missing.
Lower Assam division is one of the 5 administrative divisions of Assam in India. It was formed in 1874, consisting of the undivided Kamrup district of Western Assam, undivided Darrang and Nagaon districts of Central Assam and Khasi & Jaintia hills of Meghalaya, created for revenue purposes. The division is under the jurisdiction of a Commissioner, who is stationed at Guwahati. The division currently covers the Western Brahmaputa Valley. Shri Jayant Narlikar, IAS is the current Commissioner of Lower Assam division.
Operation All Clear was a military operation conducted by Royal Bhutan Army forces against Assam separatist insurgent groups in the southern regions of Bhutan between 15 December 2003 and 3 January 2004. It was the first operation ever conducted by the Royal Bhutan Army.
In December 2014, a series of attacks by militants resulted in the deaths of more than 76 people in India. The attacks took place in the Chirang, Sonitpur, and Kokrajhar districts on 23 December 2014. They were attributed to the Songbijit faction of the National Democratic Front of Bodoland.
Ingti Kathar Songbijit is a militant leader who once led the secessionist faction of National Democratic Front of Boroland (NDFB) in North-East India.
Assam – 16th largest, 15th most populous and 26th most literate state of the 28 states of the democratic Republic of India. Assam is at 14th position in life expectancy and 8th in female-to-male sex ratio. Assam is the 21st most media exposed states in India. The Economy of Assam is largely agriculture based with 69% of the population engaged in it. Growth rate of Assam's income has not kept pace with that of India's during the Post-British Era; differences increased rapidly since the 1970s. While the Indian economy grew at 6 percent per annum over the period of 1981 to 2000, the same of Assam's grew only by 3.3 percent.
Chandan Brahma is a politician from Assam belonging to the Bodoland People's Front who represented the Sidli Assembly constituency of Kokrajhar district from 2006 until 2021. He was first elected to the Assam Legislative Assembly in 2006 as an independent candidate and later joined the Bodoland People's Front.
On 30 December 1997, gunmen belonging to National Democratic Front of Bodoland gunned down 12 Bengali Hindus in the outskirts of Nislamari in Darrang district. The dead included a six-month-old baby and six women. On the next day the group attacked another village nearby and killed 9 Bengalis.
Pramod Boro is an Indian politician serving as the president of the United People's Party Liberal (UPPL) since 2020 and the 2nd and current Chief Executive Member of the Bodoland Territorial Council since 2020 representing Koklabari. He was the former president of All Bodo Students Union from 2009 to 2020.
Ranjan Daimary alias D.R. Nabla is the founder president of the armed separatist outfit National Democratic Front of Boroland. Daimary initially founded a militant group named Bodo Security Force in October 1986. Later, in 1994, Bodo Security Forced was renamed as National Democratic Front of Boroland.
G Bidai is the Commander and Vice-president of the militant outfit National Democratic Front of Boroland (NDFB). He is on the National Investigation Agency's (NIA)'s most wanted list, a primary counter-terrorist task force of India, with a bounty of Rupess 0.5 Million.