Bangla soldiers fire at Indian villagers

Discarding a status quo agreement, personnel of the Bangladesh Rifles on Sunday opened fire on Indian villagers, prompting the Border Security Force to retaliate at three places along the international border in Meghalaya, but, there was no report of any casualty.

Residents of Muktapur was engaged in fishing along the border when the BDR personnel threatened and opened fire on them.

BSF personnel rushed to the area, escorted the villagers to a safer place and retaliating the fire, BSF sources said.

Heavy exchange of fire between both the forces was also reported from Ratangtila and Latangtila areas all located inside a 3 km distance from each other in Jaintia Hills district.

However, there was no report of any casualty. This is the third time this month that the BDR opened unprovoked firing in the area bordering Sylhet district of Bangladesh.

Two additional companies were deployed by BSF following the previous two firing incidents on February 4 and 14, which had led to evacuation of villagers to a safer place.

On February 17, a DDG-level coordination meeting was held at Tamabil in Bangladesh to douse the tense situation and the border guards of both the countries had agreed to maintain status quo and not to fire at each other.