New Delhi, Dec 26 The Congress on Sunday demanded independent probe by a sitting High Court Judge in Nagaland killings and Rs 1 crore compensation to the kin of the deceased.
Addressing a press conference on Sunday, Congress leaders Gaurav Gogoi and Ajoy Kumar said, "The SIT that has been announced by the government of Nagaland is an eyewash and the Congress party believes that no meaningful resolution is possible as evidenced by the government's false statements in the aftermath of the incident in Mon. The Congress Party demands that a commission of inquiry headed by a sitting judge of the Gauhati High Court immediately should be set up as such an independent committee will enable the country to understand the true events that took place on December 4-5 in which 14 (fourteen) people lost their lives."
Both the leaders were part of Congress delegation constituted by Sonia Gandhi, which submitted its report on Friday.
It said that on December 4, Saturday around 4.00-4.30 p.m., a unit of the '21 Para Special Forces' organised an ambush on suspected NSCN (K) Yung Aung faction cadre near Tiru village, Mon district, and instead of gunning down the suspected militants, killed eight civilian miners belonging to Oting village who were returning home in a pickup truck when the attack took place.
Out of the 8 (eight) miners, 6 (six) were immediately killed as a result of the ambush and 2 (two) were severely injured. The villagers on searching for the missing miners and discovering their bodies retaliated in anger on the local armed forces and in the ensuing firefight 7 (seven) more civil and one jawan were killed.
On December 5 (Sunday) agitated crowd burned down the Konyak Students Union Office and in the police firing that ensued one more civilian was killed. In total, as a result of the unfortunate incidents, 14 (fourteen) civil and 1 (one) jawan were killed.
The Congress alleged that instead of rushing to the site of the incident to take stock of the shocking intelligence failure that led to the deaths of 14 (fourteen) civil and 1 (one) jawan, Union Home Minister Amit Shah was at a political rally in Rajasthan.
A minister in the UDA government of the state and the BJP chief in Nagaland contradicted the statement made by the Home Minister in Parliament. As per newspaper reports, the minister from Nagaland stated that "the innocent victims were labourers returning from a hard day's work and were not armed with any firearms whatsoever. It is therefore tantamount to war crimes during peace time and amounts to summary execution as well as genocide."
The Congress demanded Compensation to the victims of the violence. It said all the victims should be compensated by the central government. The family of the deceased should be given compensation of Rs 1 crore and a job with the government. The injured may be awarded compensation of at least Rs 10 lakh.
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