AGARTALA, May 31?Kailasahar police foiled an attempt to form a ?Tripura Bengali Mukthi Force? when they arrested six youths. Police also recovered a country-made gun and materials for crude bombs.

According to police sources, six youths Pankaj Das, Ranjan Das, Anukul Nama, Ajit Das Dipankar Kar (27) and Badal Roy (24) were nabbed while they were holding a meeting in the house of Badal Roy. They were planning to attack and kill people of a particular community in retaliation to offences by militants against Bengalis. The youths were also distributing leaflets in the name of Tripura Bengali...

NEW DELHI, May 31? Lt Gen (Retd) Ajay Singh, who has spent considerable number of years of active service in the North-east, is likely to be named the next Governor of Assam, informed sources said today, reports PTI. Lt Gen Singh, who served as the General Officer Commanding-in-Chief of the 4 Corps in 1992, would replace Lt Gen (Retd) S K Sinha who would take over as Governor of Jammu and Kashmir on June 4. The sources said the name of Lt Gen Singh was approved by the government and a formal notification is likely to be issued after President APJ Abdul Kalam returns from his official tour to...

AGARTALA, May 30 ? A feature film in Tripura?s tribal language (Kokborak), Mathia, has been awarded the first prize in the feature film category at the 18th International Film Festival held in Warsaw from May 19 to May 25, the director of the film Joseph Pulinthanath said here on Thursday.

Festival director Ardrzej Jonuszewski in a communique from Poland informed director of the film Joseph Pulinthanath that Mathia had been awarded the first prize in the feature film category for its ?realistic depiction of the culture and heritage of a community in India?, the director said.

The story of...

TURA, May 30?Financial institutions such as the State Bank of India (SBI) are slowly closing their branches in the interior areas of Garo Hills because of continuous militant threats for failing to pay up to the ultras, State Bank of India, which has the largest network of banking services in the Garo Hills extending way into the interior areas, has already closed down its third branch in the region. The SBI has a total of 44 branches in the entire Garo Hills though 24 are loss making in terms of profit making for the institution.

The first branch to be closed down due to militant threats was...

Guwahati, May 30: Ulfa commander-in-chief Paresh Barua seems to be living the charmed life of a cat with nine lives: he reportedly survived the fifth attempt on his life by unidentified gunmen in Dhaka on Tuesday.

Like on the previous four occasions, this time, too, there has been no official confirmation from the Bangladeshi authorities on the incident. Even the Bangladeshi media has come out with reports denying the news of the latest ?attack? as ?baseless?.

The mass-circulated English daily Independent quoted the new commissioner of Dhaka Metropolitan Police Md. Ashraful Huda as saying...