Four Bodo youths, one constable held for Assam blast links

Guwahati, Nov 6 (UNI) Four Bodo militants and one Assam Police constable were today arrested from lower Assam's Nalbari district's Shantipur area in connection with the CJM campus blast here.

Special Investigating Team IGP R Chandranathan, who led the team in the arrests, confirmed that the five had been arrested, of whom four are suspected to have links with the National Democratic Front of Bodoland (NDFB), a Bodo militant group currently in ceasefire.

The fifth, one Chandra Boro, is an unarmed constable at the SP (Kamrup) office here, barely half-kilometre away from the CJM campus blast site as well as Pan Bazaar blast site.

The four Bodo youths have been identified as Raju Boro, Bhela Boro, Arabindo Boro and Bhupen Boro. They were being brought to Guwahati for interrogation, the IGP said.

The Bodo militants had reportedly worked as the local partner of the Jehadis and provided their men for assisting the Jehadi ultras.

The jehadi hand has been almost completely confirmed in the blasts, though the extent of involvement of the Bodo outfit or any other group is yet to be ascertained.

The police had earlier traced the owner of the Maruti car (no. AS 01 M 0327) to Nagaon's Jonali Saikia, whose husband was arrested later and the couple brought to Guwahati for questioning.

They had, however, maintained that their car was bought from a Maruti True Value outlet a couple of years back.

Besides Mr Saikia, four others had been arrested for possible terror links but no direct evidence had been found against them.

UNI MT-SG KK PD CS1655