Encounter in Zinam Valley, one HPC-D cadre killed

way2barak, Dec 3 :The Assam police gunned down a suspected member of an armed group in an encounter in Assam’s Dima Hasao district late Monday night.

A district police officer said the incident occurred at around 11 p.m. near Chillei village under the Mahur police station after armed members of the Hmar People’s Convention (Democratic), or HPC(D), intercepted a vehicle, fired two rounds in the air, and threatened the driver.

“The armed men fired at the personnel from a nearby Assam Police Command Battalion camp who rushed to the spot after hearing the shots. One suspected militant was killed in the retaliatory response,” the officer said, requesting anonymity.

The body of the man, identified as Modi Hmar from the district’s Jinam Valley, was sent to southern Assam’s Silchar Medical College and Hospital for an autopsy. “He is suspected to be a member of the HPC(D),” the officer said.

The HPC(D) was formed in 1995 as an offshoot of the HPC, which came into existence in 1986 as a political party spearheading a movement for self-government in a part of Mizoram bordering Assam and Manipur. The HPC gravitated to an armed revolution until signing a peace pact in July 1994.

Active primarily in Mizoram, the HPC(D) has been using the Bhuban hill range in southern Assam’s Cachar district and the Jinam Valley area of Dima Hasao district as bases to plan and execute its operations.