Guwahati: The outlawed United Liberation Front of Asom (Independent) here on Saturday accepted responsibility for the grenade attack in Upper Assam’s Sibsagar district on Thursday but outright rejected the report the National Investigation Agency (NIA) wherein it had held Ulfa-I responsible for Dhola massacre.
The Ulfa-I rebels had hurled grenade on a hardware shop in the Demow Chariali area, killing a customer, Anup Gupta, and the shopowner, Kamal Agarwal, on Thursday.
Ulfa-I’s publicity secretary Arunoday Asom in a press statement sent to newspapers on email said, “Our organisation would like to make it clear that we are not involved anyway in November 1 killing of Dhola. We also challenge NIA to inform the people of Assam that on what ground they are accusing our organisation of that killing.”
The banned outfit also slammed all Indian investigating agencies, but it has appreciated the Intelligence Bureau (IB). “We feel IB is slightly different from the rest of the agencies. However they are not above suspicion,” it added.
The outfit further said, “We along with people of Assam have understood that investigative agency like NIA is being used as tools by the government and ruling BJP to fulfil their vindictive agenda.”
The Ulfa-I, which owned the responsibility of grenade attack at Demow, also regretted the killing of a civilian. “We take responsibility for Thursday’s explosion and sooner or later stern action will be taken against those who betray us. But our target was not the customer Anup Gupta but the owner of the shop.”
Though, outlawed Ulfa-I has denied the charges, Assam Director General of Police Kuladhar Saikia on Friday said that a six-member team of Ulfa-I militants was behind the killing of five Bengali-speaking persons at Dhola in Tinsukia district on November 1.
According to the preliminary investigations conducted by police and NIA, there was sufficient “technical evidence” about a six-member team of the Ulfa-I being behind the Tinsukia killing incident, the DGP said while outright rejecting clarification issued by Ulfa-I.
