More Indian election killings
NZPA-Reuter New Delhi Renewed violence hit Assam ahead of a second round of polling today as conflicting reports of a massacre in the strife-torn north-east Indian state fuelled tension.
India’s two leading news agencies said that as many as 150 people may have died in the week-end bloodbath when tribal gangs armed with' axes, and spears attacked 15 villages, burning down hundreds of thatchedroof huts. But the state government in the Assam capital of Guahati continued to say that the reports were exaggerated and that only 10 bodies had been recovered.
An official spokesman said 1500 huts were razed in 15 villages. Police were sent to the area by helicopter after bridges were burnt down. The Government spokesman said a big convoy of relief supplies had now reached the Darrang area and more were being sent. More than 115 people had already died across the state in violence in the run-up to elections for a 126-member local assembly and 12 representatives in the national Parliament in Delhi.
The elections, opposed by anti-immigrant Assamese militants, are being held in three stages. The first round of voting took place on Monday and there are further rounds today and Sunday.
In the latest violence, a candidate for the Congress (I) Party of the Prime Minister, Mrs Gandhi, was killed when attacked by an election meeting crowd. The Press Trust of India news agency reported the deaths of 11 other people on Tuesday.
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Press, 17 February 1983, Page 1
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246More Indian election killings Press, 17 February 1983, Page 1
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