Three employees of the Oil and Natural Gas Corporation (ONGC) were on Wednesday kidnapped by suspected ULFA(I) militants from its Lakwa oilfield in Sivasagar district along the Assam-Nagaland border. The PSU, in a statement, said that the three employees have been abducted by unknown armed miscreants in the early hours of Wednesday from a rig site of ONGC in Lakwa field of Sivasagar.

The three employees have been identified as M M Gogoi and Ritul Saikia -- both junior technicians (production) -- and Alakesh Saikia, a junior engineering assistant, an ONGC spokesperson told PTI. "The abducted employees were taken by the miscreants in an operational vehicle belonging to ONGC. Later, the vehicle was found abandoned near the Nimonagarh jungle close to the Assam-Nagaland border," the statement said.