President of the Mizoram Bru Displaced People’s Forum Elvis Chorkhy said over phone that the sub-divisional magistrate of Kanchanpur sub-division in North Tripura received a fax message from the Mizoram Government that the refugees would be taken home to Mamit district by vehicles arranged by it from May 25.
He said that the refugees would be ready to return as soon as vehicles were provided by the Mizoram Government.
State Home department sources said that two officials were sent to Kanchanpur sub-division to arrange vehicles for repatriation of the refugees.
The State Government, following instructions from the Union Home Ministry, had earlier decided to begin the repatriation process from May 11 and complete it by May 15, but this could not be done as the refugees demanded Rs 1,500 for each family for hiring vehicles to return home.
Only nine of the Bru families returned home on Saturday, the last day of the proposed repatriation.
The Brus had fled to Tripura following the gunning down of a youth by Bru militants near the Mizoram-Tripura border on November 13 last year.
The proposed repatriation of thousands of Bru refugees lodged since October 1997 in the six relief camps in Kanchanpur sub-division from November 16 last year had not only failed to take off, but triggered another exodus after after the killing of the youth.
The Bru refugees fled Mizoram in 1997 following the murder of Lalzawmliana, a forest guard inside the Dampa Tiger Reserve by the Bru National Liberation Front (BNLF) militants.
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