Police recovers arms

SHILLONG, APR 26:  A huge cache of arms and ammunition was recovered by the police from Rongcheng forest in South Garo Hills district and arrested two women for concealing the arms suspected to belong to the United People’s Revolutionary Alliance (UPRA).

A police team from Shallang police station at Khalu-Rongcheng areas in South Garo hills, bordering West Khasi Hills district, recovered the arms while conducting counter-insurgency operation.

West Khasi hills SP Sylvester Nongtnger informed that the operation was carried after a tip-off and in the process recovered arms, ammunition, grenades, VHF sets, documents and other materials from a hole in the jungle and two women were responsible for hiding them.

Nongtnger said a SLR Rifle, three .303 sniper rifles, AK magazine, two SLR and .303 magazines, three Chinese grenades, seven VHF sets, 52 rounds of live AK ammunition, 134 rounds live SLR ammunition, 23 rounds live .303 ammunition, two rounds live MMG ammunition, a letter pad containing 94 leaflets of the UPRA and a pocket diary, two rubber stamp seal of “Matchadu Matchabet MM HQ Durama” and “Achik Matgrik Society”, medicines, 15 syringes, 7 needles, syrups etc. were recovered from the jungle.

The two women have been identified as Nosanchi M Sangma and Stilla M Sangma, both of Rongcheng village, and were arrested for concealing the weapons and a case has been registered at South Garo hills, Nongtnger informed. The recovery also comes after the arrest of former ANVC (B) militant Tengrak K Sangma alias Buga. An AK 47 rifle, two SBBL gun, two AK magazines and 36 live AK ammunition was also recovered from him from the same area recently.

Meghalaya IG (operation) GHP Raju felt that UPRA might have been created to hoodwink the security. “These materials are suspected to be hidden by militants with the ulterior motive of either selling them to other militant groups or using them for committing crimes later after official disbandment/surrender of the organizations,” he said.-By Our Reporter