4 CRPF men gunned down in Assam, 1 injured

Two days before the first phase of assembly polls in Assam, ethnic insurgent outfit Karbi Peoples Liberation Tiger (KPLT) today gunned down four CRPF jawans and injured another in an encounter in Karbi Anglong district.Several CRPF men are missing after the encounter, police said.Last night, an operation was launched by the CRPF in the Deothar area, under Bokajan police station, against the newly-formed KPLT militants, they said.The CRPF personnel came face to face with a large group of KPLT rebels at Arlangso today and an encounter ensued in which four CRPF men were gunned down, they said.An injured CRPF man was admitted to Numaligarh Refinery Ltd (NRL) Hospital in neighbouring Golaghat district.Three of the victims were identified as Mika Singh, Debendra Shaw and Dilip Kumar.The operations were continuing, the police said, and a search was on for the missing CRPF men.The KPLT was formed on January eight last by an anti-peace talk breakaway group of 25 members of the Karbi Longri National Liberation Front (KLNLF) after it had laid down arms.The KPLT had given a call for an indefinite district bandh from Thursday last as it had not received a reply from the political parties to its five-point charter of demands, including autonomous statehood for Karbi Anglong, halt operations against the outfit and development of the education facilities here.The extremist outfit had, however, withdrawn its bandh call from this morning.The district will go to the polls on Monday with 61 other constituencies in the first phase of voting.