127 'grenades of Bangladesh Liberation War' found in Tripura

Around 127 grenades, suspected to have been used during Bangladesh's War of Independence and buried underground, have been recovered in northern Tripura.

Local villagers said the grenades might have been buried by the Indian Army in the 1971 war.

Hrishekesh Paul, an aged villager said, “Once this area was dense forest and so the military had set up their camp here. They fought and liberated Bangladesh. Currently, where there is the central school, three cannons were set up there for shelling along with a few bunkers during the Bangladesh war.”

Villager Rakesh Sukla Baidya, while digging mud, found two round metal balls near the central school at Gaurnagar late on Sunday.

Villagers thought these were grenades and immediately alerted the police.

So far, nearly 127 rusted grenades have been dug up.

Police have sanitised the area and set up a temporary camp while the digging is going on.

During the war, a camp of the Indian Army was there.

Bomb squad and forensic team are to visit the spot for digging out the entire area to find out if anything more is left.

Tripura had six to seven camps in four sectors from where the Bangladeshi freedom fighters fought Pakistani forces after taking arms training in Tripura.

Over 1,600,000 Bangladeshis - a number larger than the state’s then total population of 1,500,000 - had taken shelter in Tripura alone.

The nine-month-long war later turned into a full-scale India-Pakistan War, leading to the surrender of nearly 93,000 Pakistani soldiers in Dhaka on Dec 16, 1971.

Tripura shares 856 km borders with Bangladesh.