Jhapa becoming hideout for Indian militant... CBI search for Nicole

Ekantipur, KAKADVITTA (JHAPA), FEB 07 - Jhapa has become a haven for members of various Indian underground armed outfits and criminal groups, police here said.

On January 26, Indian police in civvies arrested three senior militant leaders of Kamtapur Liberation Organisation (KLO) near Kakadvitta in Jhapa. KLO has been waging an armed struggle for a separate state comprising of the districts in West Bengal and Assam states in India.

The arrested trio--Tarun Thapa, Pratip Raya and Ramshankar Prasad--was wanted by the Indian police for their alleged involvement in a bomb explosion at Jalpaiguri district in West Bengal on December 26, 2013.

The Indian police had also arrrested two senior leaders of People's Revolutionary Party of Kangleipak from Kakadvitta last year.

It is said members of Indian underground armed outfits active in the Indain states of West Bengal, Assam, Manipur and Nagaland are hiding in Jhapa's Kakadvitta, Bahundangi, Bhadrapur and Jyamire.

Sources said the Indian authorities have moblisied plain-clothes police officers in Jhapa to arrest the leaders and members of such groups.

Meanwhile, Nepali authorities have said the Indian police are entering Nepal without permission.

Deputy Superintendent of Police (DSP) Basanta Rajaule said the Indian police do not coordinate with them while arresting militant and criminal suspects inside Nepal's territory.

A team from India's Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) had reportedly spent a month in Jhapa and Ilam, searching for a Nikkal Tamang, the man suspected behind the assassination of Madan Tamang, the president of Akhil Bharatiya Gorkha League, without informing Nepal's law enforcement agency about their mission.

DSP Rajaule said the CBI team had returned after they did not find their suspect here, DSP Rajaule said.