Militants struck in a big way on Wednesday night killing eight Hindi-speaking people, including three women and two children in far-flung Ampathar village under Howraght police station in Karbi Anglong hill district of Assam at around 8.30 pm.

Police claimed that it was an operation carried out by 20-odd armed militants belonging to the proscribed United Liberation Front of Asom and tribal militant group Karbi Longri North Cachar Hills Liberation Front.

A senior police official in central Assam informed that a group of about 20 militants belonging to the KLNLF and ULFA raided Ampathar village inhabited by Bihari farmers and opened indiscriminate fire, killing eight persons including three women and two children on the spot in a virtual re-run of the unprecedented carnage of Hindi-speaking people by the banned ULFA in Upper Assam districts in January 2007.

The police rushed additional forces to the area from district headquarter in Diphu to provide security to vulnerable villagers.

Earlier, in the day two persons received minor injuries when suspected ULFA militants triggered a blast at Hengerabari locality in Guwahati. The bomb was planted in a rickshaw.

Militants belonging to banned United People's Democratic Solidarity, a faction of which is now in truce agreement with government of India, had gunned down scores of Bihari sugarcane farmers in Karbi Anglong hill district in the year 1999 creating widespread terror.