Kidnap buzz sparks highway block - 10-hour protest by tribals ends after news of leader’s arrest in Bihar

TT;Islampur, Aug. 28: Tribals blocked NH31 for almost 10 hours at Islampur yesterday over the alleged abduction of their leader, but withdrew it when they found out he had been arrested by Bihar police and taken to Kishenganj. 

 However, this morning, they gheraoed the office of the district magistrate in Kishenganj, 30km from here, for five hours demanding Ramu Hembram’s release. Some of the tribals also blocked the highway again, this time for an hour. Hembram, 45, a resident of Bihar’s Sitalpur, was leading a movement to reclaim land that had been occupied by non-tribals who had set up tea gardens on the plots.

 Yesterday, Hebram’s wife Bharati filed a complaint with Islampur police saying a group had stopped the tribal leader at Millanpalli while he was travelling towards Bihar on a motorcycle. The men forced Hembram inside an SUV and the car sped towards Bihar. She told the police that she was with Hembram when the incident happened around 3pm. 

Bharati alleged that Hembram was abducted by people against whom he had been leading the movement. Around 4pm yesterday, 300-odd adivasis, armed with bows and arrows, blocked NH31. The blockade continued till 1am while vehicles on both sides waited in queues several kilometres long. 

 The subdivisional police officer of Islampur, Subimal Pal, said Bihar police confirmed Hembram’s arrest after 10pm. “Around midnight the subdivisional police officer of Kishenganj, Poonam Kesri, and the additional district magistrate, Shatrughan Singh, informed the agitators their leader had been arrested. Some of the protesters went to the Kishenganj police station and met Hembram. The blockade was lifted after that,” Pal said.

 “The Bihar police should have informed us earlier (about the arrest). Policemen in plainclothes had arrested Ramu from Milanpalli around 3pm yesterday,” the SDPO said. Hembram was arrested for his involvement in a case of alleged arson and rioting in April. He was produced in court at Kishenganj today and remanded in judicial custody for 14 days.