Assam blocking movement of vehicles carrying medical supplies; claims Mizoram health minister

Following the Assam-Mizoram border clashes, medical supplies, including Covid-19 test kits were being blocked to enter Mizoram from Assam due to blockade in the Barak Valley region, claimed Mizoram health minister R Lalthangliana, PTI reported.

However, Assam, said that currently no organisation is doing any blockade. At present, Mizoram is battling the second wave of the Covid-19 and is one of the most affected states in the country.

Mizoram health minister alleged that vehicles carrying Covid-19 supplies such as test kits and medicines were stuck on NH-306 in Assam’s Cachar district.

“According to sources, a state-sponsored economic blockade has been clamped in Assam. Vehicles carrying consignments of essential commodities and life-saving medicines are stranded in the Dholai-Lailapur area in Assam,” Lalthanliana told PTI, adding they would approach the Centre to take the initiative for resumption of movement of traffic.

On July 26, six people were killed and scores injured in an armed dispute along the Mizoram-Assam border.

Nearly 95 percent of essential supplies come to landlocked Mizoram through Assam via NH 306, according to Mizoram chief secretary Lalnunmawia Chuaungo

Mizoram Home Department had written a letter to the Union Home Ministry twice in three days between July 28 to July 30, seeking its intervention to immediately lift the alleged economic blockade clamped by the Barak Valley civilians. The department also seeked for the restoration of railway tracks damaged by miscreants in almost three regions in Assam.

On Sunday, Kolasib Superintendent of Police (SP) Vanlalfaka said that no vehicles, except those of security forces, have entered Mizoram from Assam since the border dispute.

The police personnel claimed there are no restriction on traffic movement on the Mizoram side and everyday few vehicles are entering Assam. On Saturday, nearly 70 vehicles left for Assam, he added.

“We are making efforts to ensure that vehicles manned by non-tribals move freely to Assam. No resident of Mizoram is creating any problem as the people are convinced that it is not a communal issue but a border dispute between the two states,” he told PTI.

There is no further escalation in the inter-state border situation as Central Armed Forces have been deployed, who are patrolling the border areas.

Recently, Mizoram’s Chemist and Druggist Association had written to the state chief secretary seeking the state’s intervention for resumption of supplies from Assam.

The association had alleged that on July 29, Assam in the guise of security concern had verbally briefed all transporters in Guwahati not to book any goods, even medicines, for transportation to Mizoram.

The letter also alleged that several courier companies have been barred from booking letters and parcels.

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