Guwahati(IANS) : Separatist rebels Saturday blew up an electric transmission tower in northeastern India’s Assam state, disrupting power supply in the area, the police said.
The transmission tower belonging to the public sector North Eastern Electric Power Corporation (NEEPCO) was blown up by an improvised explosive device (IED) near Mahmara in the eastern Sivasagar district, about 350 km from state capital Guwahati, a police spokesman said.
“There has been no casualty in the blast but power supply in the area has been disrupted,” the spokesman said.
No one has claimed responsibility for the attack but police believe rebels of the outlawed United Liberation Front of Asom (ULFA) were involved in the incident.
On Thursday, a police bomb disposal squad had defused a high intensity bomb planted near a railway station in the same district, averting heavy casualties. The nearly two-kilogram IED was fitted on to a power transformer located at the Borhat railway station in Sivasagar district.
“There would have been heavy casualties as the railway station was packed with passengers waiting for some local trains when an alert policeman spotted the bomb and reacted immediately,” a senior police official had said.
On that occasion too, the ULFA was believed to have planted the IED.
On Tuesday, police recovered two bombs from the same district — one planted near an oil pipeline belonging to the state-owned Oil and Natural Gas Corp (ONGC) and the second one kept near the office of the Sivasagar police chief.
There were intelligence reports about possible ULFA attacks with the state scheduled to hold village council elections in Assam next month.
“Security forces have been put on alert across Assam, especially along vital oil and gas installations, besides railway stations, and government buildings,” an intelligence official said.