After the Indian Army, along with Assam Rifles personnel, rescued two abducted ONGC employees from the clutches of the United Liberation Front of Asom-Independent (ULFA-I) late on Friday night, the separatist group said on Saturday that two of the three ONGC employees were safe, but the third one had gone missing. ULFA-I spokesperson Rumel Asom said that since the three ONGC employees, all ethnic Assamese, were “picked up” by their fighters from a rig site at Lakwa in Assam’s Sibsagar district on Wednesday, 500 soldiers and armed policemen mounted an operation to rescue the abducted staff.

Asom said the forces encircled the ULFA fighters at Totok in Nagaland’s Mon district. “Keeping in mind the security of the abducted ONGC employees, our fighters left them in the safe custody of the local Tangsha Naga villagers. Alokesh Saikia and Mohini Mohan Gogoi were recovered safely by the security forces but we have no idea what happened to Ritul Saikia,” the spokesperson said. He said the ULFA is checking whether Saikia, an assistant junior engineer with ONGC, had been hit during the encounters, while disowning responsibility for such an eventuality.