Communal violence claims 34 lives in northeast India

A series of deadly attacks by tribal separatists in the troubled northeastern India has claimed lives of at least 34 people, security sources say.

The attacks took place in the two districts of Kokrajhar and Sonitpur in India’s remote northeastern state of Assam on Tuesday.

Senior state police official SN Singh said at least 26 persons were gunned down in Sonitpur district alone, while other were killed in Kokrajhar on Tuesday evening, adding that at least four woman were among the dead.

According to police sources, Rebels from one faction of the National Democratic Front of Bodoland (NDFB) were behind the attacks.

The violent attacks have prompted security forces to start a massive search for the assailants.

The Assam state government is criticized for failing to restore law and order to the region.

The developments come as ethnic violence in Assam continues to take a heavy toll on the Bengali-speaking Muslim population in the volatile region.

According to government officials, hundreds of Muslims and other minority groups have fled their villages to safer locations fearing a rerun of the 2012 communal clashes that took the lives of nearly 110 people.

Several rebel groups have been fighting the government and sometimes each other for years in India’s seven states in northeast.

The NDFB wants a separate homeland for the region’s ethnic Bodos who account for 10 percent of Assam’s 33 million people.

More than 10,000 people, most of them civilians, have lost their lives in such violence in Assam.