By IANS
Guwahati : Four people, including a ruling Congress party leader and two policemen, were killed in an ambush by tribal separatists Saturday while four people were wounded in a grenade attack in Assam, officials said.
A police spokesman said a group of heavily armed militants of the Black Widow faction of the outlawed Dima Haolam Daogah (DHD) and the Hmar People’s Convention (HPC) jointly attacked two vehicles near Riaejol village in North Cachar Hills district, about 280 km south of Assam’s main city of Guwahati.
“The militants fired indiscriminately with automatic weapons on the two vehicles. One of the vehicles managed to evade the gunfire and sped away,” police official A. Das told IANS by telephone.
The dead were Darbiekthom Hmar, a Congress candidate for elections to the North Cachar Hills district autonomous council, his two personal security guards and the driver. The council elections are due on Nov 29 and Dec 3.
“All the four occupants in the second vehicle died in the attack. The militants later decamped with the service weapons of the two personal security personnel attached to the Congress candidate,” the official said.
The DHD (Black Widow) is a rebel group fighting for an independent homeland for the majority Dimasa tribe in southern Assam. The HPC is a rag-tag rebel group seeking a homeland for the Hmar tribe in the region. Both groups work in tandem in parts of southern Assam.
In the adjoining district of Karbi Anglong, four people, including two Home Guards personnel, were injured in a grenade attack late Saturday evening, the police said.
“Bus passengers and others were crowding a market place in the highway-side town of Silonijan when a grenade blast took place, wounding two passengers and two Home Guards men,” a police official said. The injured were admitted to a local hospital.
The identity of the attackers could not be ascertained immediately.
On Friday, Black Widow rebels ambushed and killed seven paramilitary troopers in the same district. The army, police and paramilitary forces have since launched an offensive in the area.
“A security review meeting was held and a massive crackdown launched to hunt for the rebels,” a senior police official said.