Surrendered militants in Tripura threaten to launch fast-unto-death

Agartala, Nov 14 (UNI) The surrendered extremists of the outlawed National Liberation Front of Tripura's (NLFT) Biswamohan faction have threatened to resort to fast-unto-death stir unless the state government withdraws all pending cases against them.

In a letter to Chief Minister Manik Sarkar yesterday, 43 NLFT returnees, who have been undergoing vocational training under Central government schemes at Lachi in South Tripura, said despite repeated pleas and subsequent assurance from government, the pending cases had not yet been withdrawn.

''A large number of cases of murder, kidnapping and extortion are still pending against us in different courts in the state, which has become a cause of great anguish to us. Though the state government has assured us to withdraw all cases, except murder, against the surrendered extremists, nothing has been done so far,'' the letter underlined.

The letter also pointed out that Special Branch (SB) authorities had advised them to collect all the case details from each of the police stations, but could not do so since they had been undergoing training.

The returnees have issued ultimatum to the state government and sent a copy to Union Home Minister Shivraj Patil as well Tripura Governor D N Sahaya in this regard and said the date of agitation would be announced on November 25.

Meanwhile, the vocational trainees/returnees, who have been undergoing training at Love Story Vocational Training Centre, have decided to launch hunger strike soon for the same demand.

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