By Anil Giri, IANS,
Kathmandu: Jhapa, the easternmost district of Nepal and sharing its border with India’s West Bengal state, has become a haven for members of various Indian underground armed outfits and criminal groups, the Nepal Police has said.
On Jan 26, Indian police in civilian attire arrested three senior militant leaders of the Kamtapur Liberation Organization (KLO) near Kakarbhitta in Jhapa.
The KLO has been waging an armed struggle for a separate state comprising districts in West Bengal and Assam states in India.
Again on Thursday, Nepal Police stationed in Jhapa district arrested KLO vice-chairman Tom Adhikary from Bhadrapur, the district headquarter of Jhapa. Along with him, the Nepal Police also arrested another top KLO leader, Ninambar Rajbanshi, from the same location.
Adhikary is wanted by the Indian police since last year in connection with the Bojrapara blast in which six people were killed.
“The arrested trio (near Kakarbhitta) — Tarun Thapa, Pratip Raya and Ramshankar Prasad — were wanted by the Indian police for their alleged involvement in a bomb explosion in Jalpaiguri district of West Bengal Dec 26, 2013,” The Kathmandu Post reported Friday.
The Indian police had also arrested two senior leaders of People’s Revolutionary Party of Kangleipak from Kakarbhitta last year.
It is said that members of Indian underground armed outfits active in the Indian states of West Bengal, Assam, Manipur and Nagaland have found safe shelter in Jhapa’s Kakarbhitta, Bahundangi and Bhadrapur.
Sources said Indian authorities have mobilised plain-clothed police officers in Jhapa to arrest the leaders and members of such groups.
Meanwhile, Nepali authorities have said the Indian police are entering Nepal without permission or prior intimation.
Though the Nepal Police have been cooperating in several arrests in bordering areas on Indian tip-offs, sometimes Indian police enter Nepal without informing the Nepali side creating a difficult situation, according to the Nepali side.
Deputy Superintendent of Police (DSP) Basanta Rajaule of Jhapa district said the Indian police do not coordinate with them while arresting militants and criminal suspects inside Nepalese territory.
A similar case took place last year in Nepalgunj in western Nepal. Indian police in uniform entered Nepal’s territory and arrested a Nepali citizen creating a big diplomatic issue.
“A team from India’s Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI), without informing Nepal’s law enforcement agency about their mission, had reportedly spent a month in Jhapa and Ilam, searching for a Nikkal Tamang, the man suspected behind the assassination of Madan Tamang, the president of Akhil Bharatiya Gorkha League,” said the Post.
DSP Rajaule said the CBI team had returned after they did not find their suspect here.