Guwahati, Feb 4 (IANS): In the run-up to the Assembly elections, six people were arrested in Assam's Kokrajhar district, bordering Bhutan and West Bengal, and a huge cache of arms and ammunition including five AK series rifles and 8 Chinese hand grenades seized from them, police said on Wednesday.
In a separate incident, Assam Rifles troopers seized over a thousand detonators and gelatin sticks in Cachar district along the Assam-Meghalaya border.
An Assam Police spokesman said that acting on a tip-off, police personnel laid a trap on Tuesday night at Nasraibil village (under Gossaigaon police station) and detained a Scorpio vehicle, which was carrying the arms, ammunition and explosives.
Besides the five AK-56 rifles and the Chinese hand grenades, the other arms and ammunition include 8 AK-56 magazines, 11 underbarrel grenade launchers cell, 300 cartridges, other ammunition and five mobile sets. The police seized the vehicle and arrested six people -- Swmkwr Basumatary, Rabinath Narzary, Pungka Basumatary, Mwktang ABasumatary, Manipal Mushahary and Snmanjay Basumatary, all aged between 25 to 35 years old and residents of Sonitpur and Kokrajhar districts.
In Cachar, Assam Rifles troopers seized a vehicle and recovered 600 detonators and 542 gelatin sticks.
The driver of the vehicle which was coming from Meghalaya and another person were arrested in connection with the seizures.
On February 1, Baksa district police recovered an AK-47 rifle along with 107 rounds of ammunition, and one Glock pistol with eight rounds ammunition from Barimakha along the bank of Mora Pagladia river.
According to the Assam Police, during the past one year, a large cache of arms and ammunition had been recovered in the Bodoland territorial areas, comprising four districts -- Kokrajhar, Chirang, Baksa and Udalguri. The arms and ammunition recovered included 56 AK series rifles, four HK series rifles, six M series rifles, two SLRs, four INSAS rifles, 92 revolvers, 329 live grenades, huge number of country made arms and a large cache of ammunition and explosives.