Guwahati: A Bodo militant was lynched and another seriously injured by an angry mob while two people, who were part of a non-Bodo protest rally, were injured in police firing Tuesday in two separate incidents in Assam, officials said.
The two people were injured in police firing in Kokrajhar district in the Bodoland Territorial Areas Districts (BTAD), police said.
The Bodo militant was lynched in Goalpara district, police said.
The two Bodo militants had come to extort money from a trader. But villagers rounded them up and lynched one and left the other seriously injured.
In Kursakata in Kokrajhar district, protestors belonging to non-Bodo organisations took out a rally against atrocities by Bodo militants.
"Police had to intervene as some Bodo youths tried to disrupt the rally. Although the Bodo youths were arrested, the non-Bodo protestors demanded they be handed over to them," said Kokrajhar Superintendent of Police Sunil Kumar.
He said the protestors turned violent when police refused to hand over the youths.
Police resorted to baton-charge but later resorted to firing to control the situation. In the firing, two non-Bodo people were injured, he said.
Later, some protestors set fire to a police vehicle there.
In another incident in neighbouring Chirang district, supporters of the All Bodoland Minority Students Union (ABMSU), an organisation representing religious minorities in Bodoland, blocked rail tracks to protest atrocities of Bodo militants on non-Bodos living in BTAD areas.
The ABMSU condemned a recent statement by Shambhu Singh, joint secretary (Northeast) in the ministry of home affairs, who said that non-Bodo organisations opposing creation of a separate Bodoland state were not from the BTAD.
The organisation dared the official to visit the BTAD.
The BTAD region last year witnessed the worst violence between Bodos and Bengali-speaking Muslim settlers. Over 100 people died in the violence.
