Youth Tipra Federation (YTF) – the youth wing of the Tipra Motha – held a protest rally opposing the construction of an embankment by Bangladesh near the international border in South Tripura district on Monday.
The rally started from Belonia township and went up to the Bankarbazar area close to the border, where it was stopped by Border Security Force (BSF) personnel.
The protesters claimed that Bangladesh has constructed an embankment on the River Muhuri within 150 yards of the international border in violation of the 1974 Indira-Mujib pact. They also claimed that another embankment had been illegally built by Bangladesh and added that all this was being done at the behest of Pakistan and China.
The protesters raised slogans against , Chief Advisor of the interim government in Bangladesh, for claiming that Northeast India was landlocked and projecting Bangladesh as “the only guardians of the ocean” in the Bay of Bengal.
Speaking to reporters, YTF leader David Murasingh said, “We gave Bangladesh its independence. Tripura’s demography has changed due to that as well. Lots of lands belonging to Hindu Bengalis are still lying there (Bangladesh)… While terrorist attacks are being launched on Indians (at Pahalgam) in Kashmir on the western frontier, Bangladesh is creating an embankment by violating international border agreements right along the border on the eastern frontier. This is a threat to us.”
Citing the alleged attack on actor by a Bangladeshi infiltrator in last year, Murasingh said, “They (a Bangladeshi national) stabbed him (Saif Ali Khan), trying to kill him… they are becoming terrorists. They come to Tripura, , Assam, etc. After attacking, they try to return to Bangladesh. We want to warn that this wouldn’t continue for long.”
Murasingh also claimed YTF activists alone will be enough to reclaim land in Bangladesh that belonged to the erstwhile royal kingdom of Tripura.
“… Tripura’s land like Chittagong, where the Indian Tricolour was flown for three days after Independence, will be reclaimed. This land was given to the then East Pakistan by forgery. Indigenous and Hindu people are being tortured, raped there. There are no human rights,” he said.
Later in the day, Tipra Motha founder Pradyot Kishore Manikya Debbarma took to social media and wrote, “Today at Belonia, Tripura thousands of our Warriors were stopped by the BSF otherwise the illegal construction by Bangladesh would have been demolished. These are the youth of our Tiprasa all we need is a green signal, rest we will handle!”
