ITANAGAR: Over four years have been passed after the signing of BTR accord between ABSU, four factions of the NDFB and the UBPO but many leaders and cadres of the NDFB are still languishing in jails in Bhutan, Nepal, Arunachal Pradesh, Nagaland, Meghalaya and Guwahati in Assam.
The presence of NDFB cadres and leaders in jails of different states and neighbouring countries was revealed by EM of BTC Ranjit Basumatary who was the then secretary general of a faction of the NDFB when MCLA Joy Mashahary raised question on the number of pending cases against the NDFB members during the question hours of BTC budget session on the first day on Tuesday. He said a meeting of the Joint Monitoring Committee was held on January 10, 2023 and discussed the pending cases against the members of the NDFB. He said the NDFB submitted the list of members of 2070 having cases against them to the government of Assam of which 206 cases have been withdrawn, rest non-heinous cases are being taken up for release but 85 cases are heinous which are still pending. He told the house that 11 members of the NDFB had been in jail in Arunachal Pradesh, 1 in Nepal and 5 in Bhutan. He admitted that the exact figure of members jailed in Nagaland and Meghalaya was yet to be confirmed due to a certain factional gap of four groups of the NDFB. He, however, said B. Danswrang and N. Okhahadwi of the NDFB had been engaged to handle the issue and communications.
As MCLA Joy Mashahary questioned the number of 1,10,000 cases against the former NDFB members, the CEM Pramod Boro said there had been 1 lakh cases against the NDFB. He said there had been heinous and non-heinous cases against the NDFB members of which non-heinous cases are being withdrawn and others are in various stages while discussion was held on heinous cases. He said they had sought the exact figure of cases pending and withdrawn from the state government.
On the inter-state cases, Boro said a delegation from the BTC had gone to Nepal to seek support on finding out the way for their release and similarly, the discussion is on with the government of Arunachal Pradesh and Meghalaya through the state government to transfer their cases to state. He further said the ADGP of Assam Hiren Nath had been handling the issue and B. Danswrang and N. Okhahadwi from the NDFB have been engaged for communications. He hoped that all cases would be withdrawn as per the spirit of the BTR accord.
On the issue of ex-gratia payment to Bodoland movement martyrs, Boro said the sorting out of martyrs’ list of ABSU and BLT movement were quite easy but due to multiple factions, the sort listing of martyrs’ families of NDFB movement was more critical and submitted list of over 3000 martyrs. He also said the fresh submission of the martyrs’ list had been being verified. He said out of 1135 martyr families of ABSU movement, 500 families with a total of 632 families so far have been given ex-gratia of Rs. 5 lakh each while another 200 martyr families would be given the ex-gratia grant very soon. He assured that every martyr family will be given the ex-gratia and no one would be deprived.
Also Read: ABSU to protest against alleged harassment to jailed NDFB members by NIA and CBI (sentinelassam.com)
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