12 sophisticated looted arms recovered in Manipur, militant held

way2barak, Oct 30 : Security forces in Manipur recovered 12 looted sophisticated arms and a large cache of ammunition and other explosive materials during the past 24 hours, officials said on Monday.

Police said that the combined security forces during their ongoing operation recovered the arms and ammunition from Imphal East and Churachandpur districts.

The recovered arms included point 303 and point 22 rifles, carbines as well as 56 high explosive hand grenades, many mortar and tear smoke shells, huge quantities of explosives, and large quantities of various types of country made weapons.

Police also arrested a hard core cadre of Kangleipak Communist Party (KCP) militant outfit from Imphal West District. A mobile handset, a bike and cash amount of Rs 50,000 were recovered from him.

The KCP is a Maoist militant group and active in Manipur for many decades.

The combined security forces also dismantled six illegally set up bunkers by the village guards and others in Imphal East district.

According to police, a total of 5,669 different types of sophisticated arms and lakhs of rounds of different kinds of ammunition were looted by different organisations, mobs and individuals after ethnic riots broke out in Manipur on May 3.

So far, the security forces comprising central and state recovered around one fourth of the looted arms and ammunition from different districts.

On September 22, Chief Minister N. Biren Singh, while urging that all illegal weapons held by any persons or groups across Manipur should be surrendered within 15 days, had warned of taking legal action and launching search operations to recover them.