GUWAHATI: Assam Police have foiled an alleged terror plot by apprehending two members of the Paresh Baruah faction of the banned insurgent group, the United Liberation Front of Asom (Independent), or ULFA(I).
The arrested cadres were identified as self-styled Second Lieutenant Siyor Asom alias Humenjyoti Baruah (27) and self-styled Second Lieutenant Manoj Asom alias Papu Moran (30).
Police seized two AK-56 rifles, 172 rounds of live ammunition, two hand grenades, a medical kit, syringes and opioids, food supplies for jungle survival, backpacks and other war-like stores from their possession.
"A terror attack was averted in Tinsukia. An intelligence-driven operation was carried out by Tinsukia Police, with assistance from central agencies, yesterday, during which two active ULFA(I) cadres were apprehended at Jagun," the police said.
"Preliminary investigations suggest that ULFA(I) had tasked them with targeting and indiscriminately killing innocent people in Tinsukia town to create terror among the public," the police added.
According to the police, the planned modus operandi indicated the influence of external actors seeking to destabilise the region.
Police said legal proceedings have been initiated, and further investigation is under way.
ULFA(I) operates from bases in Myanmar, where its leadership is believed to be based. Tinsukia, which has witnessed several militant attacks in the past, remains one of Assam's worst insurgency-affected districts.
Tinsukia, Dibrugarh and Charaideo, all of them in upper Assam, are the state’s three “disturbed” districts where the Armed Forces (Special Powers) Act has remained enforced.