₹50K/surrender, ₹2L/rifle: Bengal lures KLO militants with rehab offer
The move comes after the state police found “telltale signs” of the proscribed outfit recovering its lost ground by making the government to lower guards through peace overtures
Alarmed by the regrouping of the Kamtapur Liberation Organisation (KLO), the West Bengal government has prepared an attractive surrender-cum-rehabilitation package to lure the militants of the outfit to the mainstream.
The move comes after the state police found “telltale signs” of the proscribed outfit recovering its lost ground by making the government to lower guards through peace overtures.
The outfit, established in December 1995, is waging an armed insurgency demanding a separate state of Kamtapur for Koch Rajbongshi community comprising six districts of West Bengal and four districts of Assam.
Also read: Bengal on alert as dormant KLO regroups after making peace overtures
The outfit last December sent feelers to the Centre through the BJP-led Assam government, expressing its desire to join peace talks. The security establishment in Bengal views the offer as a strategic move to buy time to revive the dormant outfit, which had been inactive for about a decade.
“This peace overture is nothing but an attempt to hoodwink the government to enter into a ceasefire agreement with it so that it can utilise the truce period to regroup,” said a senior police official.
Significantly, the KLO expressed its desire to hold talks with the Centre and the Assam government, by bypassing the West Bengal government. The Mamata Banerjee government in Bengal is also not keen on any peace negotiation with the outfit. Instead, it wants to weaken the outfit by luring away its cadres, a tactic that proved useful in the past.
Financial package
To bring the KLO cadres and linkmen to the mainstream, the government has readied a financial package. Under the package, a surrendered militant or linkman gets a one-time grant of ₹50,000 and a fixed deposit of ₹2 lakh. A senior police officer would be the joint account holder of the FD, which could be withdrawn by the former militant only after three years.
Further, a cash compensation ranging from ₹25,000 to ₹2 lakh is provided for depositing firearms, ammunition and grenades, sources said. For surrendering a sniper rifle, a militant gets ₹2 lakh whereas a pistol or a revolver fetches ₹25,000.
The package also includes a monthly stipend of ₹4,500 for three years, a house rent allowance of ₹2,500, medical assistance for family and educational assistance for children, sources said.
A screening committee headed by an Additional Director General-level police officer has been formed to screen surrender offers. The committee will ascertain whether the person offering to surrender is actually a KLO militant.
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In the past, the police used the surrendered KLO militants to keep tabs on their former “comrades.”
Home guards
The Trinamool Congress government, since coming to power in Bengal in 2011, has rehabilitated over 700 KLO cadres and linkmen by inducting them into home guards. They played a key role in gathering information about the outfits and keeping an eye on youths intending to join the outfit.
The KLO in June formed its new central committee with 32 members. Two women members have been included in the outfit’s highest policy making body for the first time.
Members from non-Koch Rajbongshi communities have also been inducted in the central committee again for the first time.
