Top officials meet to discuss I-DAY security

Guwahati, Aug 1 (UNI) In the run-up to the Independence Day celebrations, three separate high-level meetings were held to plan the strategy to be adopted by the government and security forces to ensure stringent security measures.

While GOC of the Tezpur-based IV Corps Lt Gen RK Chabbra called on the Chief Minister in a closed door meeting, two other meetings between top officials of the government, Army, police, BSF and CRPF chalked out a foolproof plan to deal with any sabotage attempts by militants during and before the Independence Day celebrations.

Coinciding with intelligence inputs that the ULFA might strike on the Independence Day celebrations as it had been doing in the past, the security forces in the last couple of weeks had arrested at least nine rebels of outlawed outfit and recovered a huge cache of arms.

Besides, the recovery of explosives in Upper Assam's Tinsukia district, 25 kg of TNT were found in Dibrugarh and over 1500 detonators were seized in Darrang district in the run-up to the I-Day.

The arrested militants had claimed before police that they were instructed to carry out blasts on parade grounds during the Independence Day celebrations.

Earlier, the state government had instructed all the district administrations and police to 'sanitise' and secure the parade grounds to foil any attacks by militants.

The railway authorities were also instructed to intensify frisking and checking in trains.

The ULFA was known to strike at public places and parade grounds on Independence Day.

In 2003, a blast, triggered by the outfit at a parade ground in Dhemaji, killed 13 people, including ten children and two pregnant women.

Police were on alert in areas where ONGC and OIL installations are located, while some of the parade grounds have been already cordoned off.

UNI