Sikkim: Central force to keep vigil on Sikkim lifeline


Feb. 22: Two companies of the CRPF arrived in Siliguri from the Northeast today to be deployed along NH31A, the lifeline to Sikkim, following Supreme Court directives.

While one company — each company comprises around 100 to 120 personnel — has reached Pintail Village in Dagapur on the outskirts of Siliguri, the other has been billeted in the state police lines near Darjeeling More. The third one is on the way.

The inspector-general of police, north Bengal, K.L. Tamta, said the CRPF personnel had been specifically sent to keep NH31A (runs between Sevoke and Gangtok) free from blockades round-the-clock.

“There were instructions from the judiciary to keep the highway open all times and these companies have come with specific instructions from the central government to keep this stretch of the national highway open,” Tamta said. “We have thought of deploying the three companies at Rangpo on the Bengal-Sikkim border, at Rambhi located on the highway in Kalimpong subdivision and in Siliguri.”

Police sources said senior officials were in the process of trying to get a platoon of the central force each for Darjeeling, Kalimpong and Kurseong. “Discussions are on as to whether some of them could be deployed in the three hill subdivisions as well,” a source said.

In Writers’ Buildings today, Bengal chief secretary Asok Mohan Chakrabarti said he would be in Siliguri on February 26 to discuss how to keep NH31A open at all times. “I will meet the chief secretary of Sikkim and Union cabinet secretary K.M. Chandrashekhar in Siliguri to discuss what steps needed to be taken to keep the highway open,” he said.

Since 2005, the Supreme Court has been asking the Bengal government, the Centre and political parties that call strikes in the Darjeeling hills not to block the movement of vehicles on the highway. In recent times, it had also served a notice on the Gorkha Janmukti Morcha after a petition was filed by O.P. Bhandari, a resident of Sikkim, against the NH31A shutdown.

Ever since the Gorkhaland agitation was launched by the GNLF in 1986, Sikkim has been at the receiving end with the highway getting blocked frequently during bandhs called by political parties.

source: The telegraph