Agartala, April 25: Depleted by largescale desertion and surrenders over the past few years, the banned All Tripura Tiger Force has taken a major initiative to raise a force of women cadres to launch a fresh offensive against civilians and security forces.

Altogether 187 women cadres of the Tiger Force are being trained in Tarabon, Kalu Adam, Pancherri and Bandarban areas in Bangladesh’s Chittagong Hill Tracts over the past two months. But those camps would be shifted to the nearby Arakan areas of Myanmar in case the Bangladesh government turned on the heat.

Sources in the special branch (intelligence wing) of state police said two recently surrendered militants — Khemijay Debbarma and Samprai Debbarma — who had fled the outfit’s Satcherri camp in Habiganj district of Bangladesh, had disclosed the information during interrogation.

“The duo told us that 96 of the women cadres have finished training and are currently training others. They are being trained in the use of arms, tactics of guerrilla warfare and even the technique of making bombs,” the source said.

The sources, however, expressed grave concern over the revelation that officers of the BDR attend and supervise the final phase of training in the use of heavy arms to guide the instructors.

“According to information we have received, the BDR officers attend and supervise training sessions in individual capacities in plain dress in lieu of payments,” the source said.

Tiger Force chief Ranjit Debbarma, who has business interests in Bangladesh, had visited the training camps of women cadres and in a speech told them that their job would be not only to fight security forces but lay “honey-traps” for leaders of the rival National Liberation Front of Tripura.

Khemijay and Samprai who surrendered to SDPO (Jirania) on April 11 gave a detailed picture of the privation and hardship in outfit’s camps in Sylhet and Habiganj districts and Chittagong Hill Tracts.

They told their interrogators that the outfit’s coffers are running dry because of a sharp fall in “tax” collection owing to resistance from local residents. Moreover, as many of the non-locals have shifted out of the interior areas, the outfit’s cadres have lost out on the money-spinning business of kidnapping for ransom.

“There were times during our stay in the Satcherri and other camps when procuring two square meals a day turned out to be difficult though our leaders like Ranjit Debbarma and Chitta Debbarma were leading posh lives,” Khemijay and Samprai told their interrogators.

The sleuths have also come to know that Ranjit Debbarma is trying to strike a deal with the NSCN (I-M) to buy arms.