AGARTALA, June 7 (TIWN): As expected, none of the Reang refugees, camping at Tripura Dhamcharra Kaskau relief camp, in North District who called themselves as ‘bru’ turned up for the identification process, which ended on June 5, with the Mizoram officials went back empty handed from Tripura. A team of Mizoram government has arrived at Kasko relief camp and began the identification of Bru refugees from June 2. However, another identification process would begin from July 13 at Kanchanpur. During the four days of identification and verification process at Kaskau relief camp, none of the refugees camping there turned up for identification, said official. Asked about the reason behind this, the official at Dhamcharra said, “When the identification process had begun on June 2, the leaders of the bru refugees have asked the refugees not to show up to Kasko camp for identification unless their demands are met by Mizoram government.” As per earlier tripartite talks between Mizoram Government, Mizoram Bru Displaced People's Forum (MBDPF) and Tripura Government, identification of bona fide residents of Mizoram for repatriation started at the Kaskau camp from June 2, but not a single family turned up. However, despite all out efforts, repartition of Bru refugees, sheltered in six relief camps in Kanchanpur subdivision, have been virtually derailed once again. The Central government has already offered a rehabilitation package to those refugee families who want to return to Mizoram. Under the package, a one-time grant of Rs. 85000 to each family will be given, alongwith free ration for two years after repartition process. A section of refugees who refused to turn up for the identification process claimed that there is no use of returning back to their home town as the package announced by the central government would be expired after two years, therefore after two years there would be no one to look after them, claimed the refugees.

According to the official, the Mizoram govt. would again send its officials here at Kaskau to take up the identification process once again.

The repatriation from Kaskau relief camp at Dhamcharra under North Tripura District was supposed to start from June 8, but as no refugee turned out during the identification process the Mizoram officials had to return back empty hand.

The state government made arrangements for resumption of repatriation of Brus from six relief camps in Tripura and proposed to repatriate more than 3,500 families.

The preparations came after the Supreme Court instructed both the Centre and the Mizoram government to repatriate all Brus within six months. 

At present there are at least three camps at Dhamcharra, North District. After the talks on speeding up the process of repatriation of the Mizoram Bru refugees living in Tripura, Mizoram for the first time agreed to take back all the Bru displaced persons residing in Tripura since 1997.

Bhattacharjee hoping for a positive output also said that the on-going identification process would end on June 5 and the repatriation would start from June 8 and would continue till June 12. He said, “The next identification process would begin at Kanchanpur, under North Tripura District from July 13.”

 300 refugees sheltered in Tripura since 1997; have returned to Mizoram whereas another large number of refugees who called themselves as ‘Bru’ refused to go back to Mizoram as their demands had not yet been fulfilled. They alleged that the Mizoram govt. had failed to fulfill their demands of separate autonomous body along with others.