Breaking the deadlock over repatriation of 35,000 Bru refugees, 233 Reangs of 46 families on Thursday left Tripura for their villages in Mizoram.
Abeda Nanda Baidya, sub-divisional magistrate of northern Tripura’s Kanchanpur said the repatriation of the refugees will continue till November under the supervision of the Tripura and Mizoram governments.
He said 233 people returned to western Mizoram through Damchara (border town) in a number of vehicles, arranged by the Mizoram government.
The North Tripura District administration provided food and security to them.
North Tripura District Magistrate and Collector Raval H. Kumar and senior officials of Mamit District in western Mizoram were present during the repatriations.
A Mizoram home department official in Aizawl said the Union home ministry recently approved Rs 350 crore for rehabilitation.
The approval came during a joint monitoring group meeting, chaired by Union home ministry’s special secretary (internal security) AP Maheswari, in Delhi earlier this month.
Over 35,000 Reang tribals were living in the relief camps in northern Tripura for 22 years after fleeing their villages due to communal tension.
The refugee leaders of the Mizoram Bru Displaced People’s Forum (MBDPF) in a letter to the Mizoram home minister on Monday said they would not return to their homes until demands for safety and security were met.
The letter to Mizoram home minister Lalchamliana was sent through the North Tripura District Magistrate.
The provisions of the four-partite agreement, signed in Delhi on July 3, 2018, had been violated, they alleged.
Meanwhile, the signing of the July 3 agreement, grain and other relief supplies to the Reang refugees were to be stopped to compel them to return to Mizoram.
But it was extended twice till March 31, 2019 and then again till September 30.