GUWAHATI: Seven members of a recently formed militant group were arrested by Assam Police on charges of extorting money from local businessmen and terrorizing them, police informed on Sunday.
Police said the arrests were made after investigating a case registered last month in Tamulpur district of Assam. The group had started extortion in Bodoland Territorial Region (BTR).
On Sunday, Assam Director General of Police GP Singh revealed that the group had recently made an extortion demand of Rs 5 lakh from a businessman in Tamulpur district in the name of the militant group Kamtapur Liberation Organisation (KLO).
Police had registered a criminal case against the demand on June 26. The case was registered under section 384 (extortion), 506 (criminal intimidation), 386 and 387(extortion by putting any person in fear of death or of grievous hurt) of the Indian Penal Code (IPC).
Singh said that during investigation, they found this to be a group of many ‘like- minded persons’ who had been making extortion demands on many government officials as well as businessmen of different districts in the name of KLO and the newly- formed BLA (Boro Liberation Army). He added that the group has already managed to extort money from many of the targets.
He also said that when further investigation was conducted, it was discovered that the group had recently formed a new terrorist outfit called Boro Liberation Army (BLA).
The DGP also took to Twitter saying, “@assampolice has busted the entire network of fledgling terrorist gang that wanted to start extortion in name of KLO and BLA in BTR area of Assam. Total seven persons have been arrested from different parts of Assam, Nagaland and West Bengal.”
However, Assam police acted swiftly and busted the entire members of the terror group and arrested all the BLA members from different locations across Assam, Nagaland and West Bengal, the DGP said. He also informed that investigators have secured “substantial evidence” against the suspects.
According to reports, BLA had issued a statement last month which claimed that they have launched a new group in February this year to pursue the demand for a separate state of Boroland.
Police said the seven people arrested by them have been identified as Dauharu Boro (43), Amit Boro (39), Bhumsa Chandra Boro (23), vice president Rengwna Brahma, Buddhiram Debbarma (45), Bijay Teron (23) and Kajal Rai (38).
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