No Bru refugee returns Mizoram on day one

Not a single Bru refugee arrived in Mizoram from relief camps in Tripura on the first day scheduled for repatriation of over 400 Bru families which fled the state last year in the wake of communal tension.

Not a single Bru refugee arrived in Mizoram from relief camps in Tripura on the first day scheduled for repatriation of over 400 Bru families which fled the state last year in the wake of communal tension.

HT Image

No Bru crossed the border since morning though all arrangements were made to welcome and identify them, Mamit Superintendent of Police Dingluaia said.

On Monday, Elvis Chorkhy, president of the Mizoram Bru Displaced People’s Forum (MBDPF) had said while the refugees were willing to return, they could not do so as they did not have money to hire vehicles.

The refugees demanded that Rs 1,500 be given to each family as transport expenses in advance.

There was also confusion on the number of families to be repatriated.

"While the government announced that 462 families would return, the lists sent to us said that the number of families were 284," Chorkhy said.

The Brus fled following the killing of a 17-year-old Mizo youth by Bru militants on November 13 last year at Mamit district on the Mizoram-Tripura border.

Administrative officers were designated for all the eight villages in Mamit district where the Brus were proposed to be resettled.