JORHAT, July 25 - A day after a group of armed men, suspected to be militants of a Naga insurgent group, allegedly fired at an assistant manager of a tea garden close to the Assam-Nagaland border in the district, workers today resumed their normal activities.
The gunmen had fired at assistant manager Surya Debnath at Outdivision (Sector 7) of the Seleng Tea Estate under the Selenghat Police Outpost of the Teok Police Station. Debnath had reportedly tried to leave the site on a motorcycle after he was alerted by workers who spotted the armed group entering the garden compound. The workers, too, had fled the area.
Senior manager of the estate belonging to the Kolkata-based company � Popular Tie-up Private Ltd � Prodyut Phukon told The Assam Tribune this evening that workers have started their normal work in the presence of policemen who are guarding the area.
Phukon said that he had lodged a formal police complaint regarding Tuesday�s incident and an extortion demand for Rs 60 lakh over phone by a caller claiming to be a member of some Naga insurgent group.
It may be mentioned here that the Rongkham Border Outpost of Assam Police is about 1.5 km from the site of the incident.
Phukon said as per the time table of the garden, work in the outdivision is carried out only three days a week and the Rongkham BoP is informed in advance about the working days. However, the management could not inform the BoP on Tuesday.
Teok Police Station Officer-In-Charge Satyajit Bora said that the situation was normal, and that adequate police personnel were deployed in the area.
A senior Assam Police official from Guwahati yesterday said that he suspected the hand of a Naga militant group in the incident in �retaliation� to the visit of a team of Assam Police and district administration officials to Haluwating in adjacent Sivasagar district to survey a spot to set up a BoP along the Assam- Nagaland boundary as per an Assam Government directive.
On Monday, the Jorhat district administration had clamped night curfew (8 pm to 5 am) within a radius of 5 km along the Assam-Nagaland border in the district. The order was issued by the Jorhat District Magistrate in apprehension of subversive activities in the run-up to the Independence Day on August 15.
