SILCHAR: Movement of trucks carrying supplies from Assam to Mizoram resumed late on Saturday after two Assam ministers convinced local protesters to let them pass, ending the unofficial economic blockade since the July 26 border firing that had left the hill state battling a shortage of essentials.
While movement of trucks via NH-306 from Assam’s Cachar district resumed first after 13 days, vehicles started to move through NH-6 to Mizoram on Sunday night.
Minister Ashok Singhal, who was part of the first round of conciliatory talks in Aizawl, said trucks started moving following the Mizoram government’s assurance that they would institute an inquiry into the firing in which six Assam cops were killed and scores injured.
Protesters in the Barak Valley had vandalised 12 trucks at Lailapur on Saturday just as they started moving towards Mizoram. They agreed to end the blockade after Singhal and his colleague Parimal Suklabaidya intervened.
Suklabaidya on Sunday said that there had been no encroachment on Assam’s territory by Mizoram since the BJP-led government took over the reins in 2016. “The border dispute with Mizoram has been going on since 1982 because of no clear-cut demarcation of the boundary.”
