The families of three men, who were accused of being Hmar militants and were killed by the Assam police on Wednesday, have raised questions on the encounter citing a video that showed them being nabbed from an autorickshaw.

Assam Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma had in a post announced the police killed “three Hmar militants from Assam and neighbouring Manipur”, and also recovered two AK-47 assault rifles and other firearms. Three policemen were injured in the firing by insurgents.

In a video, the three men – Joshua, a resident of Senvon village in Manipur’s Pherzawl district; and Lallungawi Hmar and Lalbiekkung Hmar, both residents of K Bethel village in Cachar district – can be seen being moved out of the autorickshaw by the police.

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The first man to step out can be seen leaving a brown bag on the seat. The others step out next, and are seen being checked by the police. A police personnel then takes the bag and steps away, before another personnel opens and rummages through it. He starts shouting that there is a pistol in it but does not pull out the weapon.

According to a statement by the Cachar police on the incident, the men had been apprehended from the autorickshaw on July 16 based on intelligence and the police had seized an AK-47 rifle, a single barrel rifle and a pistol along with ammo from them, Indian Express reported.

The police said the three men told them during interrogation that more of them, heavily armed, are hiding around Bhuban Hills “to carry out some subversive activities in the Assam and Manipur border areas.”

Later, when a police team went towards Bhuban Hills along with the three arrested insurgents to pinpoint the hideout, they came under fire from suspected insurgents hiding in the hills, after which the police team including commandos returned fire, the Cachar police said in the statement.

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The three arrested insurgents were hit during the encounter, and were taken to hospital, where the doctors declared them dead, the police said.

The families of the men said they are not aware why the men were in Cachar. Joshua’s family in Pherzawl said he had been away from home since June 10 after being called on to become a “village volunteer” once violence flared up in neighbouring Jiribam, IE reported.

“What happened to them was a human rights violation. We can see that they were in an autorickshaw and did not resist the police at all. We cannot see any weapons with them in the video. The policeman says there is a gun but doesn’t show it. He (Joshua) is not a militant. He is just a jhum cultivator who was called to be village volunteer by our apex tribal body,” said Ramhlunkim, a pastor from his village who was with the family.

Lallungawi Hmar’s uncle Lalshung told Indian Express, “They are wearing civilian clothes in the video. No weapon can be seen. There is something very wrong with the series of events the police have given. We think this was a fake encounter and the police have broken the law. We have not taken the bodies from the morgue and we will not take them till there is justice.”

Meanwhile, civil society organisations asked for an investigation into the circumstances of their deaths.

Assam Director General of Police GP Singh in a post on X today asked people to refer to the media briefing by the Cachar Superintendent of Police about the sequence of events “leading to the death of terrorists in the exchange of fire”.

“We would continue to scour each inch of Assam to keep it safe. It’s after more than three decades that there has been no death of civilians or security personnel during 2023 and 2024 till date in militant violence. We wish to keep it that way,” Singh said in the post on X.