New Delhi: The nightmare for the migrant labourers of Assam continued for the third consecutive day on Monday when the banned United Liberation Front of Assam gunned down two more migrant labourers in Golaghat area in upper Assam.
The latest killings take the toll of those dead in the two-day massacre to 67.
An alarmed Central Government has now decided to dispatch 20 companies of paramilitary forces to Assam to take stock of the situation and normalise law and order situation.
In the first major attack in Assam in a year, ULFA killed 17 people - mostly migrant labourers from Bihar and Uttar Pradesh - in fresh attacks on Sunday.
Targeting mostly people from Hindi-speaking groups, ULFA had issued strong hints in an editorial in the December issue of its mouthpiece, Freedom, about its intention to target the non-Assamese people in the state.
The warning had however, either been completely missed by the state government or the administration was merely complacent in its approach, thinking that the militant outfit would not go ahead with its threat.
However, with the death toll hitting 65 with Sunday's attack, concern has finally begun to set in.Lalu calls for calm
Meanwhile, Union Railway Minister Lalu Prasad, who is visiting the violence-hit Tinsukhia district, said the ULFA has resorted to violence to make its presence felt as it had become a dead organisation.
"By killing the poor, they wanted to send a message to the Centre," Prasad was quoted as saying by news agency PTI in Dibrugarh while talking to Hindi-speaking people of Upper Assam districts.
Prasad also assured that all precautionary measures were taken to ensure safety of the passengers travelling by train to and from Assam passing through Bihar.
Prasad also urged people to refrain from rumour mongering and asked them to boycott the militants.
"I repeat the Union Minister of State for Home Sri Prakash Jaiswal's statement here yesterday that the Centre holds the power to deal with those separatist elements with a strong hand," Prasad said.
He also insisted that the local people of Assam were in no way involved
in the wanton killings by the ULFA and that he would also urge the authorities to provide necessary resources to the state government for intensifying combing operations in the state.
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