The Bodo Liberation Tigers Force (

abbreviated An abbreviation (from Latin ''brevis'', meaning ''short'') is a shortened form of a word or phrase, by any method. It may consist of a group of letters or words taken from the full version of the word or phrase; for example, the word ''abbrevia ...

BLTF), also known as the Bodo Liberation Tigers (abbreviated BLT), was an armed

militant group The Militant Group was an early British Trotskyist group, formed in 1935 by Denzil Dean Harber, former leader of the entrist Marxist Group in the ILP, as a separate entrist group inside the Labour Party. Initially known as the Bolshevik-Leni ...

that operated in the

Bodo Bodo may refer to: Ethnicity * Boro people, an ethno-linguistic group mainly from Northwest Assam, India * Bodo-Kachari people, an umbrella group from Nepal, India and Bangladesh that includes the Bodo people Culture and language * Boro cu ...

dominated regions of

Assam Assam (; ) is a state in northeastern India, south of the eastern Himalayas along the Brahmaputra and Barak River valleys. Assam covers an area of . The state is bordered by Bhutan and Arunachal Pradesh to the north; Nagaland and Manipur ...

India India, officially the Republic of India (Hindi: ), is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by area, the second-most populous country, and the most populous democracy in the world. Bounded by the Indian Ocean on the so ...

. The BLTF was founded on 18 June 1996 by

Prem Singh Brahma Prem Singh Brahma ( brx, प्रेम सिंह ब्रह्म; 1952 – 2007) was the former leader of the Bodo Liberation Tigers Force and deputy chief from 1994 to 1996. He later renounced violence and joined the Congress A co ...

and

Hagrama Mohilary Hagrama Mohilary (born 1 March 1969) is an Indian politician who has served as the Chief Executive Member of the Bodoland Territorial Council. Mohilary was elected as the Chief of Executive Committee of the Bodoland Territorial Council which c ...

was the chief of the outfit. The group initially wanted to carve out a separate autonomy of

Bodoland The Bodoland Territorial Region (BTR), informally Bodoland, is an autonomous region and a proposed state in Assam, Northeast India. It is made up of five districts on the north bank of the Brahmaputra river below the foothills of Bhutan and A ...

, but surrendered with the establishment of

Bodoland Territorial Council The Bodoland Territorial Council (BTC) is an autonomous council for the Bodoland Territorial Region established under 6th Schedule of The Constitution of India according to the Memorandum of Settlement between Bodoland Liberation Tiger Force ( ...

, an upgrade of the Bodo Autonomous Council. The leaders of the BLT, together with the leaders of the

All Bodo Students' Union All or ALL may refer to: Language * All, an indefinite pronoun in English * All, one of the English determiners * Allar language (ISO 639-3 code) * Allative case (abbreviated ALL) Music * All (band), an American punk rock band * ''All'' (All a ...

, formed a political party called

Bodo People's Progressive Front Bodo People's Progressive Front ( BPPF) is a political party in Assam, India, formed on 12 April 2005 for participation in the Bodoland Territorial Areas District elections. Split The party suffered a vertical split into BPPF(R) with Rabiram ...

Memorandum of Settlement

On 10 February 2003, representatives of the BLTF and the governments of Assam and India reached an agreement and signed a Memorandum of Settlement (MoS) in

New Delhi New Delhi (, , ''Naī Dillī'') is the capital of India and a part of the National Capital Territory of Delhi (NCT). New Delhi is the seat of all three branches of the government of India, hosting the Rashtrapati Bhavan, Parliament House ...

. 2,641 cadres surrendered and laid down their arms on 6 December 2003 at

Kokrajhar Kokrajhar () is a town in the Bodoland Territorial Region, an autonomous territory in Assam, one of the North Eastern states of India. Kokrajhar town is located along the bank of the river Gaurang. The North East Indian Railways divides the ci ...

. A vast majority of them were absorbed in the CRPF. On the following day, an interim 12‑member executive council of the Bodoland Territorial Council (BTC) was formed in Kokrajhar. The main provisions of the MoS related to "the creation of the Bodoland Territorial Council, an autonomous self-governing body within the State of Assam and under the provisions of the Sixth Schedule of the Constitution of India to fulfill economic, educational and linguistic aspirations, socio-cultural and ethnic identity of the Bodos, and to speed up the infrastructure development in BTC area". The BTC would comprise 3,082 villages in four districts— Kokrajhar and the three yet to be created: Chirang, Udalguri and Baska. The BTC would have 40 elected representatives and the Assam government would nominate six more. Of the elected representatives, 30 seats would be reserved for tribal leaders, five for other indigenous Assamese leaders, and the remaining five would be open for general contest.

References

{{reflist Bodoland Bodo Bodo nationalism Rebel groups in India

Memorandum of Settlement

See also

References