Elite NSG commandos train cops in Meghalaya's insurgency-hit Garo hills

Shillong (Meghalaya), Aug 14 (ANI): As the presence of insurgents, separatist groups and growing rift between tribal people in Meghalaya are posing a serious security challenge, the police and paramilitary forces are facing a tough challenge to deal with the incidents of kidnappings, killings and land mining. Therefore, the country's elite force, the National Security Guard (NSG), has come forward to train the police and paramilitary forces to deal with the insurgent outfits. Some 40 security personnel of Meghalaya police and Border Security Force (BSF) from Garo hills were given special training by the NSG team. They were taught technique of defusing bombs and disposing them. "Let's take the Kokrajhar attack for example. If you have the manpower and the expertise then security forces could retaliate and neutralize militants. In a bomb attack, militants always have the advantage more than the bomb squad, but it is the responsibility of the security forces to try their level best," S.S. Kynjing, DIG Western Range, Meghalaya told ANI. "You have been taught how to deal with a threat - by cordoning off the area and then estimate and identify what kind of IED is there. This is very important to begin with. Not the actual detonation. Whether it is NSG or any other force in the world, detonation is a very difficult task," Kynjing added. Detailed information about different types of IEDs and the way these are planted by insurgents was also given out during the training. The personnel were also trained on standard operational procedures (SOPs) for bomb disposal and IEDs. In February and March alone, Meghalaya police had detected about 60 IEDs from East Garo Hills, including five IEDs from a school premises. "If we inculcate this training in our daily lives and career then we can save our lives and everyone else's life. You will have a lot of responsibilities when you go out in the field and you need to remember that it is not only the bomb sqaud's duty to handle an IED. As police officers, we should also know how to handle such situations in case the bomb squad is unable to reach there," said Mukesh Singh, Superintendent of Police, West Garo Hills. Such trainings are more essential than ever since in the past three years, at least 30 people, including security forces, were killed in IED blasts in Garo hills. (ANI)