Chetia ‘wants to return’ to India

bdnews24.com :ULFA leader Anup Chetia, currently incarcerated in Bangladesh, has reportedly expressed his willingness to be repatriated to India where he is wanted for murder, abductions and extortion.Indian High Commission’s official JP Singh met Chetia at the Kashimpur High Security Central Jail on Thursday.Singh asked the ULFA leader whether he was interested in repatriation to India. Chetia said yes.Jailor Jannatul Farhad said Singh went to the jail at around 11am on Thursday and spoke to the ULFA leader in the presence of jail Superintendent Md Mizanur Rahman. During the 45-minute discussion, Chetia said he was interested to go back to India if there were no legal complications. Police arrested him on Dec 21, 1997 from Dhaka’s Mohammadpur. He was sentenced to three, four and seven years in jail for trespassing into Bangladesh, possession of forged Bangladeshi passports and foreign currency, and possession of a satellite phone, respectively.His prison term ended on Feb 25, 2007 and he has been kept at the Kashimpur prison since 2012. New Delhi wants Chetia back so that he could join other ULFA leaders in the peace process with the government. Paresh Barua, who heads the outfit’s military wing, is opposed to peace talks. He faces death penalty in Bangladesh for his involvement in trying to smuggle ten truckloads of weapons in Chittagong in 2004.Since its inception in 1979, the ULFA has been pursuing an armed rebellion against the Indian government with the professed objective of liberation of Assam from what it calls “colonial rule of New Delhi”.