NEW DELHI: The
National Investigation Agency has recovered Rs 27 lakh from Shelly Sumi, wife of Niki Sumi – a self-styled commander of north east based insurgent group
NSCN (K), for allegedly extorting money from government servants in Nagaland and further transferring the same to the outfit’s camps in Myanmar.
The searches at Shelly Sumi’s residence comes a week after four Nagaland government officers - former tourism director Purakhu Angami; additional director of agriculture V Aza; joint director of irrigation Hutoi Sema and fisheries superintendent Kekhriesatuo Tep - were arrested for allegedly funding the insurgent group from the state exchequer.
In a statement on Tuesday,
NIA Spokesperson – Inspector General Alok Mittal said that they had information that Shelly Sumi and her associates were in possession of cash and other incriminating documents pertaining to banned group Nationalist Socialist Council of Nagaland (Khaplang faction) in their houses in Dimapur, Nagaland.
“Accordingly, searches were conducted at the houses of the accused persons Shelly Sumi, Ikheli Yeptho, Shutoli and Hozheli at Naharbari Basti, Dimapur, Nagaland on Tuesday and cash amounting to Rs 27,90,550 was recovered from these premises,” he said.
The agency said that the seized money, suspected to have been extorted/collected from the public/government servants, was meant for sending to the NSCN-K camps in Myanmar to fund activities prejudicial to the sovereignty and integrity of India.
Twelve mobile phones, three laptops, one hard disk and 33 incriminating documents have also been seized during searches.
Earlier, on April 7 this year, based on a specific Intelligence received regarding movement of Shelly Sumi believed to be carrying huge amounts of money to Myanmar to fund NSCN-K, a mobile check post was established near Karong Village on NH-2 by the Assam Rifles and a bus moving from Dimapur to Imphal was intercepted.
These four accused persons were arrested along with cash worth Rs 18 lakh at that time.