For N-E firefight, Govt rolls in troops

North Block sources said that the decision to move another infantry brigade was taken after a series of consultations between the Home and Defence ministries. The brigade’s deployment in Assam will be decided by the Unified Headquarters, being ‘‘reactivated’’ to check the slide in the North-East.

The Unified Command is expected to meet on Friday followed by a meeting of the Strategy Command which has local formation commanders as members.

DGPs of the seven N-E states are meeting on October 14 and 15 in Guwahati to discuss a joint strategy to counter insurgent groups.

All these decisions were taken today at a high-level meeting at North Block. Chaired by Home Minister Shivraj Patil, it was attended by Army Chief General N C Vij, chiefs of paramilitary forces, Director of Intelligence Bureau A K Doval and senior Home officials.

Special Secretary (Internal Security) Anil Chaudhary said it was also decided to step up vigil on the borders and improve the visible presence of security forces — Army, police and Central forces — in public places.

The RPF and CISF would be asked to tighten vigil along railway tracks and oil pipelines.

Conceding that the intelligence network in the North-East needed to be strengthened, Chaudhary said the IB had been asked to coordinate and link the flow of information from different states and from the Army.

‘‘Small tactical groups will be constituted for the purpose. They will collect information from remote places and share it with others.

The key to counter insurgency operations is a well-coordinated intelligence effort. The aim now is to get actionable and tactical intelligence,’’ he said. To this end, the village defence parties in Assam are also being energised. ‘‘These can be very helpful in getting local intelligence and assistance,’’ he said.

According to Chaudhary, available intelligence suggested that the Assam blasts had been carried out jointly by the ULFA and NDFB. He admitted that the security agencies still had no clear fix on the blasts in Dimapur, Nagaland. In Dimapur, powerful IED blasts were triggered on October 2. The use of 10-15 kg of RDX and timer devices has been established. In Assam, hand grenades were mainly used by the militants.