Amid fears that elements across the border may try to sneak in to aggravate the continuing unrest in Assam, the Border Security Force has alerted its forces, particularly in Dhubri district, to step up vigil.
The Intelligence Bureau, in a situation report accessed by this newspaper, warned “such violence (may help) extremist groups in Bangladesh rope in fundamentalist outfits in Assam to instigate communal violence.”
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh will visit Assam on Saturday to take stock. He is expected to review the relief measures taken by the state government.
Demanding Central intervention, a group of MPs led by Congress leader K. Rahman Khan on Thursday met home minister P. Chidambaram, saying they had lost confidence in the Tarun Gogoi government’s ability to control the violence. The Muslim MPs, including Tariq Anwar (NCP), Asrarul Haque (Congress) and Sabir Ali (JD-U), said they have “never seen such kind of ethnic violence in India”, and added: “There is failure somewhere.”