The youth, identified as Ajen Konyak of the Tizit area in Nagaland, was arrested from the Naginimora area located on the Assam-Nagaland boundary of Sivasagar district on Thursday. OC (Namtola) Apurba Kumar Bora said, "We have got a letter from Tizit police station in Nagaland that the prime accused of the woman murder case has been arrested yesterday. The accused was now in judicial custody and Nagaland Police have asked us to take him in remand for investigation." He added, "We will file a petition to the chief judicial magistrate, Mon, to take the accused in police remand on Saturday. As the arrested Naga youth is suspected to be the prime accused in the brutal killing, a clear picture would emerge only after grilling him in police remand."
The officer said Naga miscreants hacked Beli Rai to death at her residence on January 17 and police had registered a case under Section 302 (Murder) of the IPC at Namtola police station.
As many as seven organizations led by the the Gorkha Students' Union imposed an indefinite economic in Sivasagar district from January 22 in protest against the incident. Later, the district administration of Mon assured the agitated Assam-based organizations of arresting the culprit by January 31.