Kuda village council calls it abuse of AFSPA by the military personnel
Dimapur, March 15 (EMN): The residence of the former president of Naga Council Dimapur, Savi Liegise was once again raided by the Assam Rifles in the early hours of March 15, according to the Kuda village council.
In a statement issued on Thursday, the council expressed shock and outrage over the raid conducted at the residence of Liegise who is an advisor to the council. Personnel of the 32 Assam Rifles had conducted the raid between 3 am and 3.48 am on Thursday ‘causing immense mental trauma to the members of his family especially his daughters (aged 12 and 14), his wife and three sisters’, it stated.
The council recalled that it was the second instance of military forces raiding Liegise’s residence ‘during a time the Nagas have entered into a crucial peace dialogue for solution’ – the first occasion being a raid by the 37 Assam Rifles in 2015.
“Today’s fruitless dawn raid, barely a fortnight after assembly election, was carried out by the 32 Assam Rifles column purportedly based at Firing Range, Dimapur, numbering above 30 led by a Captain Jaish. The Council learned that the entire house was overturned, searched and rummaged by the soldiers for what was said as looking for ‘unlicensed weapons’.
“Even the bathrooms and kitchen were not spared. The sisters later found two silver rings missing from the bathroom where a lady cadre, a Naga, who identified herself as a Christian, speaking Nagamese went in twice. There were two other lady cadres in the column one of whom frisked the wife and the two minor daughters of our leader, which was nothing but sheer humiliation,” the statement read.
According to the council, Liegise had “never owned any illegal weapons nor is known to be associated or involved with any underground factions whatsoever except his relentless battle for communal peace and harmony right up to this day”.
It stated that the raid was either ‘a politically-motivated scheme or someone’s nefarious design to malign’ Liegise’s image.
The council also stated that it will not remain “silent spectators if any untoward incident befalls upon him through such scheming” while urging ‘all civil organisations to raise voice in earnest for immediate revocation of this draconian law AFSPA, 1958 which is being abused to harass the public’.
