The gradual consolidation of peace in North-Eastern State of Tripura, which began with the decimation of the enduring insurgencies in 2008, continued strengthened further in 2010. The State, once engulfed in violence, is almost terror free now. However, remnants of militants groups remain unprepared to give up arms, and are able to engineer occasional acts of violence.
On December 8, 2010, for instance, militants belonging to the National Liberation Front of Tripura (NLFT) attacked a temporary shed of labourers at Govindabari village of Dhalai District and abducted 11 construction workers at gunpoint. On December 9, two of the abducted workers were released, but the whereabouts of the others are yet to be ascertained. Police sources suggest, "The NLFT rebels might have taken the captives into neighbouring Bangladeshi territory as the India-Bangladesh border is just four kilometres from the spot (where the abduction occurred)." According to the villagers, the NLFT militants had earlier demanded ‘subscriptions’, which the villagers did not pay. The December incident reflects the principal pattern of surviving militant activity in the State, with the insurgent groups struggling to recover vestiges of what was once a massive extortion network.
The trend of declining fatalities, however, continued into 2010. According to the South Asia Terrorism Portal (SATP) database, total fatalities in 2010 stood at just three, including two Security Forces (SF) personnel and one militant. In 2009, 11 persons, including nine civilians, one Security Force (SF) trooper and one militant, were killed in 2009. Remarkably, not a single civilian was killed in 2010. At the peak of insurgency in Tripura, in 2000, this tiny State of under 3.2 million people witnessed as many as 514 insurgency-related killings, including 453 civilians,16 SF personnel, and 45 militants.
The three fatalities in 2010 occurred in two separate incidents. On August 6, 2010, two Border Security Force (BSF) personnel were killed in an improvised explosive device (IED) blast triggered by the NLFT in the Ratia area under the Chawmanu Police Station of Dhalai District. On April 6, 2010, the body of a Bru National Liberation Front (BNLF) militant, identified as Thankima, was recovered inside Tripura near the Mizoram border in the last week of March 2010. Police is investigating the case to find who had killed Thankima. According to Police, Thankima was the main accused in the killing of one Zarzokima, a 17-year-old Mizo youth of Bungthuam village, in Mamit District in western Mizoram on November 13, 2009. The Mizoram Police had then arrested six persons in connection with the Bungthuam killing which had triggered communal violence between Mizos and Brus, forcing hundreds of Brus to flee to the neighbouring Tripura.
There were also some small recoveries of arms and ammunition. On March 13, 2010, the SFs recovered two locally made guns and ammunitions from two separate locations of the South District. A locally made gun, AK-47 ammunition and 19 ‘tax collection’ receipts of the NLFT were found in the Khambar Para area. The Police also recovered a locally made gun during a search operation in the house of Sanjit Reang (37) in the Dashamani Para area.
Only three militants were reported to have been arrested in 2010. Both of these belonged to NLFT and were arrested from the North District. In 2009, the number of militants arrested was 20.
With the insurgencies withering, militant cadres continued to surrender to the SFs. In 2010, as many as 127 militants – NLFT (79), All Tripura Tiger Force (ATTF, 28) and Bru Liberation Front of Mizoram (BLFM, 20) – surrendered in 33 incidents. By comparison, 243 militants surrendered in 2009 – ATTF (43), NLFT (77), Borok National Council of Tripura (BNCT, 119) and unidentified (2). Among the most significant surrenders of 2010 were:
October 12: Six NLFT cadres surrendered to the Assam Rifles in West District. However, the cadres did not deposit any arms or ammunition.
August 11: 16 NLFT cadres deserted their camps in Bangladesh and surrendered before troopers at Manikpur in Dhalai District and at Kanchanpur in North District.
July 2: At least 13 ATTF militants surrendered before the Assam Rifles in Agartala.
June 24: The 10 NLFT militants escaped from their camps in different places of Bangladesh and crossed over to India and surrendered before the BSF and Assam Rifles troopers in different places of Tripura.
On October 27, Chief Minister Manik Sarkar urged people to motivate youth who had taken to militancy to shun the path of violence and return to normal life. "Hundreds of tribal youth have left militancy over the past few years. The state Government has provided economic resettlement to them (surrendered militants)," Sarkar said, while addressing a gathering at Tamakari tribal village in West Tripura District. Sarkar disclosed, "Some Government employees had also joined militancy and subsequently surrendered. The Tripura Government has returned their jobs to them. This is never done in other States in India." The Chief Minister reiterated his appeal to the militants to give up the path of violence and join the mainstream. "Come and join your family, we would help you in all matters."
A continuous stream of surrenders and the sense of entitlement the surrender scheme has generated in surrendered cadres over the years, have, however, led to some administrative problems, with surrendered militants complaining about delays in their promised resettlement. This was highlighted when, on March 24, 2010, over 1,200 surrendered cadres of NLFT and ATTF launched a 72-hour hunger strike demonstration in Tripura, asking the Government to rehabilitate all former insurgents.
While major militant groups such as the ATTF and BNCT have become virtually inactive, the NLFT continues to make its presence felt, particularly through incidents of extortion and abduction. The most significant incidents of 2010 included:
September 11: Three NLFT militants were arrested by the BSF from North District along India-Bangladesh border. The militants said that they fled from Bangladesh base camps.
August 30: The NLFT has abducted five tribals from remote Shukraichari area under Gandacherra sub-division of Dhalai District.
August 6: Two BSF personnel were killed in an IED blast triggered by the NLFT militants in the Ratia area under Chawmanu Police station of Dhalai District.
May 24: A group of NLFT militants clashed with Tripura State Rifles (TSR) personnel at Satraipara under Manikpur Police outpost in Dhalai District.
May 22: A group of 10 NLFT militants stormed Shermoon village under Kanchanpur sub-division of North District and demanded 20 per cent of wages from 123 National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (NREGA) workers. The militants later left the area after an encounter with troopers of the 9th Battalion of the TSR.
April 20: Six suspected armed militants of the NLFT abducted a person, Sankar Bijoy Chakma, of Apanbooli village in Dhalai District.
Meanwhile, the ATTF suffered vertical split in 2010. Three top leaders of the outfit – its self styled ‘president’ Ranjit Debbarma, armed wing chief Chitta Debbarma and ‘central committee member’ Rahul Debbarma, were ousted from the outfit in a coup led by Sachin Reang on December 26, 2010. Sachin Reang, assumed the title of ‘acting president’ and, in a phone call to media organizations on December 26, declared, "Ranjit Debbarma, Chitta Debbarma and Rahul Debbarma were indulging in large scale financial corruption and acting like dictators. Serious allegations of their indulging in luxurious lifestyle and spending funds for personal benefits were raised in our general meeting recently. They were unmindful of the sufferings of the Tripuri communities. They acted in such a manner that severely affected the morale of the cadres and forced them to surrender." He also claimed that the ousted ‘president’ Ranjit Debabarma and his minions had embezzled at least INR 100 million. This is the first time since its foundation in 1992 that the ATTF has suffered a split. The change in leadership could lead to changes in the outfit’s structure and some violence. Significantly, Sachin Reang has declared himself against the surrender of ATTF cadres.
Successful counter-insurgency operations over the years have brought peace to Tripura. Lingering irritants persist, but they have little potential for a revival of the widespread violence and disruption that once afflicted the State. Tripura is, indeed, a model exceptional counter-insurgency success, and one that other States in India, as well as other countries across the world, could learn much from.