Arunachal Pradesh: Army kills farmer, later calls it case of 'mistaken identity'

The incident took place in Arunachal Pradesh’s Changlang district bordering with Myanmar on Wednesday night.

According to the reports, a civilian identified as Thingtu Ngemu was shot dead by the commandos of elite 21 Para (Special Forces) believing him to be a NSCN militant, while the troops launched counter-insurgency operation at Kongsa village in the district.

Local people said that, the farmer was shot dead by the army personnel when he had gone out to buy betel leaves.

“When Ngemu did not return, the villagers sent eight youth to look for him and found his dead body,” a villager of Kongsa said.

Meanwhile, army had called it a case of mistaken indentity.

“It is clarified with reference to the incident of one villager getting killed in Changlang on night June 14-15, 2017. The army troops had laid an ambush in this particular area based on hard intelligence with regards to movement of a group of Hardcore terrorists. It was during this time the individual who has got killed, came into the ambush and on being challenged he made very suspicious movements and rushed towards the ambush party, which forced them to open controlled fire resulting in the individual suffering fatal injury. It is a case of mistaken identity,” Defence PRO Colonel Chiranjeet Konwer said.

Army has intensified counter-insurgency operation against ULFA (I), NSCN (K) militants in the region, as the area is used as transit route from Myanmar.

(Reporting by Hemanta Kumar Nath)