Guwahati: There has been a turn of events in the Laskar Bazar incident of Hailakandi from Friday night. The Hailakandi Police has claimed that it is not an incident of child kidnapping as was reported earlier.
On Friday, six persons who had come from nearby Sonai to Hailakandi’s Laskar Bazar were attacked and later taken hostage by the local people accusing them to be child lifters. They were then locked in a house and beaten up by the residents.
The situation grew tense as the Hailakandi Police along with CRPF jawans tried to rescue the hostages and control the situation. The mob attacked the Hailakandi police team with sharp weapons and stones resulting in injury to OC Hemant Kumar and his 7 colleagues. Two CPRF jawans also got hurt during the violence. The police resorted to lathi charge and finally managed to get hold of the hostages. Police officer Hemant Kumar has been shifted to Silchar as his injury was grave.
Speaking to media, one of the persons who is a policeman and was in the group-of-six that was attacked by public said, “We had come from Sonai in search of a stolen buffalo. Acting on a tip-off when we reached Laskar Bazar, we clicked the image of the buffalo being loaded to a vehicle. They knew that they have been tracked. Following which, we were attacked. I showed my identity card and repeatedly told them about our visit but they would not listen. We were beaten up and our Ertiga vehicle was set on fire.
“We had reached the place of incident within twenty minutes. We saw that there were 15-20 police personnel and around 3 to 4 thousand locals. The situation had gone out of control. We must thank the Hailakandi police administration. The role played by Assam Police in rescuing these people is really commendable,” said Nizamuddin Choudhury, MLA Algapur.
“Some persons had come from Cachar and it was feared that they were child kidnappers and the public started taking action. I request the public again and also inform that not a single incident has been reported in the District in the last three months. Also, there is not a single case of missing person. So this fear psychosis has been built on rumour basis. There has been no incident of kidnapping. Administration and the police are taking all steps to ensure no further disturbance. Kindly do not believe in romour mongering on the social media,” said Keerthi Jalli, Deputy Commissioner, Hailakandi.
