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| Extortion demands on the rise |
| Assam's main commercial hub, Guwahati's Fancy Bazar, is run mostly by Marwari businessmen, ULFA's richest source of money after tea and oil.
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| INDIA
, 11-December-2007
0:9:50 AM |
| The government has said that militancy is going down in the North East but extortion figures given out by intelligence agencies tell another story. People feel more terrorised than ever before.
NDTV discovered that militant groups on ceasefire pacts with the government are as active as their underground counterparts.
Assam's main commercial hub, Guwahati's Fancy Bazar, is run mostly by Marwari businessmen, ULFA's richest source of money after tea and oil.
Extortion demands have only gone up here. Unlike ULFA outfits, the National Democratic Front of Bodoland or NDFB, run a more organised racket of illegal tax collection.
The money demanded by them is not in lakhs. While the amounts are less, the target base has increased.
''Yes the fact is that extortion is very much there but about I don't know about increase,'' said Tarun Gogoi, Chief Minister, Assam.
Sources in the intelligence agencies have all the details. The NDBF demands 6 per cent from all projects, which falls under Bodoland territory.
Every truck passing thorough the Bengal-Assam border at the Sri Rampur Gate has to pay up 150 rupees.
Each commercial taxi is charged 150 rupees per month. The NDFB takes a 2 per cent cut from all salaried employees. It charges 2-3 lakhs per annum from tea gardens.
They have even charged 3 per cent from the money meant for education projects like Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan.
''Not only ULFA, all extremist groups extort even in ceasefire. The difficulty is to catch them but we are trying to reduce the rate. I have told police that no one should indulge in extortion. Extortion is terrorising to some extent,'' Gogoi added.
The NDBF has been on a ceasefire pact with the government since 2005. Its members are not supposed to move out of the three designated camps. But NDTV found there are no more than 200 surrendered militants in each camp.
Reports say many more are outside, armed and kicking, running large-scale extortion networks.
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