Sikkim, Bengal cops break ice, 2 GJM leaders arrested

GANGTOK/DARJEELING: Two Gorkha Janmukti Morcha (GJM) leaders — one of whom had met chief minister Mamata Banerjee in Nabanna on August 29 — were arrested on Sunday, a day after a powerful IED blast near Darjeeling engineered the beginnings of a thaw in the frosty relations between West Bengal Police and their Sikkim counterparts, and also prompted fresh UAPA charges against

GJM chief Bimal Gurung

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Rohit Thapa, a GJM central committee member from Alip-urduar district’s Jaigaon who had met Banerjee for a bilateral dialogue, was arrested near the Bengal-Bhutan border. Sarita Chettri, a leader of GJM Nari Morcha, was arrested in the afternoon from a secret location in Kurseong, where she had been hiding.

Saturday’s explosion ripped apart a police outpost at 6th Mile, 18km from Darjeeling. The blast, 12 hours after an abortive raid by Bengal Police in Sikkim’s Namchi to flush out Gurung, left a trail of metallic splinters and could be heard by locals even three kilometres away.

The blast, at 1.30am, didn’t cause any injuries but its fallouts were felt nearly 80km away in Gangtok, when the Sikkim Police said it will cooperate with their Bengal counterparts. Sources said it was a decision taken at the highest level, which included Sikkim CM Pawan Chamling, who was given a detailed report on the September 1 raids.

Namchi, the south Sikkim assembly constituency which has emerged as the latest Bengal-Sikkim flashpoint, is not only home to the Sikkim Dem-ocratic Front (SDF) chief but has also elected him as its MLA six times in a row.

It wasn’t without reason, therefore, that SDF spokesperson Bhim Dahal minced no words while attacking state tourism minister Goutam Deb over making “unfounded and wild allegations” against the Sikkim government and its chief minister.

Deb, a day earlier, had accused Chamling of harbouring an UAPA-accused. “The Bengal police team, led by their SP, have acted contrary to existing rules and the SDF directly terms the episode as murder and kidnapping,” the ruling front added.

The Sikkim-Bengal police row, which has even led to a suo motu FIR by Sikkim police against the Kalimpong SP and his team for murder charges and common intent, showed its first signs of a scale-down. Sikkim ADGP (special branch) A Sudhakar Rao didn’t dispute CID Special SP (North Bengal) Ajoy Prasad’s claim about “raid pre-intimation”, but questioned it on technicalities. Rao also chose to sidestep posers on the FIR filed against the Kalimpong SP, saying “it is being investigated to ascertain how the whole thing happened”. Rao contended that the West Bengal POlice hadn’t followed “proper procedure”. “The letter has to be supported by the other documents like warrants and FIR copies. The raid was started without the knowledge of SP South. Nowhere has the Sikkim Police stopped them from coming in and prevented from from arresting people, but whatever they have done was without documentation. We are not harbouring criminals and do not intend to do so but they should have come with a clear mandate. We would have definitely cooperated and sent our people,” the Sikkim police spokesperson added.

Rao stressed the Sikkim Police would cooperate with the Bengal cops, but insisted on following the rulebook. “The Bengal Police can raid anywhere in the country, like we can, but the local police needs to be pre-intimated. In this case, the Bengal CID team’s request was still being discussed when another team had already arrested some persons,” he said. Acting on cue, ADG (CID) Rajesh Kumar said talks at the “SP-level” were held several times on Sunday. “We will appear before a local court (in Namchi) to seek transit remand for Savitri Rai (a former GTA sabhasad) arrested on Friday,” he said.

The state police indicated they had “reliable information” that Gurung and nearly 25 aides — all of them armed — were holed up in Sikkim and said they will soon write to the Sikkim government to act on concrete leads. Gurung’s detractors kept up the pressure on him, with renegade GJM leader Binay Tamang alleging GJM has hired “two shooters from Nepal” to assassinate him, prompting police to turn his house at Bloomfield, 4km from Darjeeling town, into a fortress with 24X7 vigil. The state has rushed in to deploy 24 IRB and RAF personnel to guard Tamang and his wife, son and father. Police snipers are manning the rooftops in and around the building premises and sandbag bunkers have been placed just near the main iron-gate.

(With inputs from Rohit Khanna in Kolkata)