According to Balananda Sharma, coordinator of the Special Committee secretariat, NA personnel and teams from the APF reached the cantonments Tuesday night and took charge of security at most cantonments from that night, and in some cases from Wednesday morning.[break]
According to him, the NA also took control of the arms of the Maoist army from Tuesday night and of the ammunition from Wednesday.
"There is no problem over security in the cantonments," said Sharma, "The handover of arms and cantonments was smooth."
But even with security coming under control of the NA and APF, the voluntray retirement process could not take place as the Maoist combatants abstained from the process.
"We had expected the process to move forward from Wednesday following the takeover of security at the cantonments by NA but the combatants did not come to our office for voluntary retirement," said Coordinator Sharma of the secretariat of the Special Committee that is responsible for providing voluntary retirement to the Maoist combatants.
Sharma said the combatants told him they did not participate in the process as they were waiting for the outcome of the Special Committee meeting called for Wednesday evening.
Survey teams from the secretariat, which halted the voluntary retirement process from Tuesday afternoon due to security concerns at the cantonments, had planned to resume the process after NA and the APF took charge of the cantonments and arms.
According to Sharma, NA and the APF completed taking charge of security at the cantonments and the arms containers by Wednesday morning. "The takeover was very smooth and peaceful," Sharma said.
Asked about the possibility of the combatants taking part in the voluntary retirement process on Thursday, Sharma said, "Let´s wait and see."
Meanwhile, some combatants at the cantonment in Kailali were not happy with the decision to hand over the PLA cantonments and arms to the NA and APF.
Disgruntled Maoist combatants started a fire at the Lisnegram Memorial Brigade satellite camp at Badaipur, Kailali.
Three makeshift camps, including a battalion office, were gutted in the fire. A team from the NA had arrived at the satellite camp at 11 p.m. Tuesday to take charge of the camp.
"Nothing belonging to me remains at the camp; I did not sleep there at night," said Section Commander Sher Bahadur Rawal.
Some ex-combatants took logistics from the camp with themselves and some among them sold these to locals.
Company Commander Rana Bahadur Bista said ex-combatants started the fire at the camp to express dissatisfaction over the NA taking charge of the cantonments so suddenly.
Meanwhile, member of the Special Committee secretariat Kul Prasad KC on Wednesday resigned from the post, expressing his dissatisfaction over the NA taking charge of the Maoist cantonments, combatants and arms.
"Our party leadership made the ex-combatants surrendered in the name of integration. So, I quit the post," said KC while addressing a press conference at Ghorai, Wednesday.
Related story
NAS calls for logo for 8th national astronomy Olympiad
-1772436151.webp)
