Staff Reporter
DIMAPUR, JULY 20
An employee of a crockery store in Dimapur was beaten “black and blue” inside Kehoi camp by members of GPRN/NSCN on Sunday, allegedly for refusing to pay tax to the outfit and “on trumped up charges that he was an Indian Army informer.”
The victim works as a manager at Orchids, a departmental store dealing in crockery items, located at Holy Cross junction in Dimapur. He is currently being treated at District Hospital, Dimapur.
According to him, around five to six cadres of the GPRN/NSCN had on Saturday evening came to the store demanding Rs 10,000 as tax money. Since the demand was not part of the outfit’s yearly tax, he reportedly asked the GPRN/NSCN cadres to reduce the amount of their demand to Rs 5,000.
“I did not say that I won’t pay them. I only asked them to reduce the amount,” he told reporters from his hospital bed on Monday. Reportedly, after much negotiation, the GPRN/NSCN cadres left with the instruction to bring the full amount of money the next day to the ISBT, Purana Bazaar.
They also locked the store and took the keys when they left, it was alleged. Subsequently, on Sunday afternoon the victim arrived at the ISBT in Purana Bazaar, only to be taken to the “outfit’s office” at Naharbari.
According to the victim, the GPRN/NSCN cadres consulted their superiors “on the phone” from their Naharbari office, following which he was taken to Khehoi camp, the outfit’s headquarters, where he was bashed up. He said that the GPRN/NSCN members refused to accept the money once they were inside the camp.
On the same evening, the GPRN/NSCN members drove him back to Dimapur, he said. His personal possession including wallet and cell phone were also returned.
Meanwhile, ACAUT Nagaland has condemned “in no uncertain terms the brutal assault” on an employee of Orchid departmental store by the GPRN/NSCN inside Khehoi camp on July 19 last. “It is unacceptable that the victim was beaten black and blue on account of his initial refusal to pay tax and on trumped up charges that he was an Indian Army informer,” an ACAUT press release on Monday stated.
It stated that the victim was forced to sign, under duress, a bond to secure his release. “…the clauses says that ‘If any of our cadres whether Dimapur town command/cadres on duty is caught by the Indian security forces, then the risk/blame shall be held against Mr. kahoto…’ and ‘In case, if I fail to abide the above cited agreement, I along with Harjeet Singh (proprietor of Orchid) shall be held capital punishment and the government shall not be held responsible (sic).
“This so called ‘Bond Agreement’ is nothing less than a death sentence made arbitrarily and senselessly, amounting to gross violation of Human Rights and thus the ACAUT declares such a bond as null and void.
Therefore, The ACAUT is left with no option but to invoke the 31st October 2014 Kohima public rally resolution that any individual threatened or assaulted on account of non-payment of tax shall not be tolerated,” it stated.
While asking the business community of Dimapur to take befitting action, the ACAUT Nagaland also urged the state government to immediately arrest “the perpetrators who have committed the inhuman act based on the evidence of the signed bond.”
