New Delhi (dpa) - At least 16 people were killed in communal
clashes between Bodo tribals and Muslim migrants in India's north-eastern Assam
state over the past three days, news reports said Sunday.
The clashes took place in Udalgiri and Darrang districts, about 100 kilometres north of Assam's main city Guwahati, IANS news agency reported.
The police found charred bodies of nine people killed in the violent clashes
since Saturday night, an unnamed district police official was quoted as saying, dpa reported.
"The casualties as of now are 16 killed and 50 wounded, some of them
critically. About 20 villages have been affected. Around 200 houses were
torched in the group clashes," the official was quoted as saying.
The violence was sparked on Friday in Rowta village of Udalgiri after a group
of village defence volunteers were attacked by armed miscreants, the police
said.
"The village defence volunteers belonged to the tribal Bodo community and
were attacked by members of a religious minority group and that sparked off the
clashes," the police official said.
The violence then spread to adjoining villages in Udalgiri and Darrang
districts.
Saturday night clashes occurred despite a curfew in the area and the presence
of large numbers of police and paramilitary troopers.
The Indian Army has also been holding flag marches in the area.
"We have asked security forces to take all possible steps to stop the
violence and restore calm," Assam Chief Minister Tarun Gogoi was quoted as
saying.
"Shoot-on-sight orders have been issued against perpetrators of
violence," Gogoi said.
"The situation is tense," the district police official said. Mobs
armed with bow and arrows, machetes, spears and homemade guns were roaming the
area targeting villages of rival communities, he said. At least nine villages
were attacked by mobs on Saturday.
Thousands of villagers have fled their homes and have been given shelter in
temporary relief camps set up by the police. "There are an estimated
10,000 people of various ethnic communities in these camps," the police
official said.
Similar clashes between the two communities had occurred in the same area in
August in which at least 10 were killed and several injured.
Bodo tribals are a local ethnic community while the Muslims are largely from
neighbouring Bangladesh and have illegally migrated to Assam in search of work.