Army chief General Dalbir Singh will review the situation in Assam Saturday, as security forces launched a major offensive against a tribal militant group that massacred over 70 people in the state this week.
A day after India sought cooperation from Bhutan and Myanmar to hunt down militants of the banned National Democratic Front of Boroland (Sangbijit), Singh will first visit Guwahati and then Sonitpur and Kokrajhar districts, which are reeling due to a massacre that killed nearly 80 people.
Dalbir Singh had met home minister Rajnath Singh in Delhi Friday over the Assam crisis.
On his arrival to Assam, the army chief would be briefed by officials about the situation on the ground, and the operation security forces had launched against the militants fighting for a separate state for ethnic Bodos.
The government extended the ban on the group by five years Friday.
An estimated 7,000 villagers have fled their homes in Assam, fearing more attacks from the Bodo militants and are sheltered in relief camps guarded by the forces and police.
Meanwhile, security measures have been stepped up along the border.
The Indo-Bhutan border guarding force, Sashastra Seema Bal (SSB), rushed 2,000 of its personnel to the state who would undertake joint operations with the army and Assam police units.
BD Sharma, director general (DG) of the armed border force, told “We will be cooperating in the operations… I don’t think I can speak more on this. We will be playing our duty of border guarding in a more stringent way.”
The forces have been continuing its crackdown against the NDFB(S) and other militants, but the dynamics have changed after the massacre in Kokrajhar, Sonitpur and Chirang districts, officials said.
Militants may have fled to neighbouring Bhutan while their leader was believed to be in Myanmar, officials and police said, prompting calls for cooperation by neighbour countries.
At least 85 people have been killed since Tuesday as Bodo militants attacked Adivasis in Sonitpur and Kokrajhar district, while 14 Bodos were killed in retaliatory attacks and three Adivasi protesters died in police firing at Dhekiajuli.
Assam is one of the seven states in the northeast that is home to more than 200 tribes and dozens of insurgencies.
The region has trailed the rest of the country in economic development and the gap has widened in recent years, fuelling discontent. Residents accuse the central government of plundering the natural resources while ignoring development.
