Four people, including two policemen, were killed in two separate incidents of violence in northeast India, police said on Saturday, ahead of a general election. Police in the region's main city, Guwahati, also recovered two powerful bombs from a militant hideout, senior police officer Manabendra Deb Rai said, less than a week after four blasts in notheastern Assam state killed 10 people. “With the recovery of these bombs, a major disaster has been averted,” Rai said. Heavily armed militants of the little known Dima Haolam Daoga (DHD), also called the “Black Widow”, attacked a local train, killing two special police officers in the North Cachar Hills district of Assam, about 350 km (220 miles) from Guwahati. The same group also attacked a goods train in the same area, injuring a security guard, railway authorities said. Train services have been suspended indefinitely. Another group of around 10 heavily armed militants of the Karbi Longri National Liberation Front (KLNLF) attacked a military patrol early on Saturday in the adjoining district of Karbi Anglong, police said. A militant and a villager were killed in a gunbattle. Both districts go to the polls in the first phase of India's April-May general election starting next week. More than two dozen armed groups in India's northeast are fighting either for an independent homeland or more political autonomy, and accuse New Delhi of plundering the region's mineral and forest resources, and neglecting the local economy. - Reuters Meanwhile, heavily armed Maoists ambushed a security forces patrol in central India on Friday, killing 10 personnel, a police official said, as the rebels step up violence ahead of the general election. More than 125 Maoists armed with AK-47s fired at a team of central reserve police force patrolling the forested Chintagufa area, about 445 km (275 miles) south of Raipur, capital of Chhattisgarh state, said Rahul Sharma, a local superintendent of police. Eight security personnel were injured in the attack in the Bastar region.
