India - Maoists call 48-hour bandh from tomorrow

Ranchi: The CPI Maoist Bihar state committee has extended the bandh call of 48 hours in Bihar and Jharkhand beginning Sunday midnight. The call for bandh has been extended to protest the killing of prominent member of Purvi Bihar Paschimottar -Jharkhand Special Area Committee Chirag da alias Pramod alias Ramchandra Mahto in Jamui district of Bihar. Chirag Da, a native of Nawadih area of Bokaro district in Jharkhand had been instrumental in laying strong foundation of the Maoist movement in Bihar and Jharkhand. He was also responsible for interstate coordination and all operations carried across the border. Maoist spokesperson of Bihar state committee Avinashji said that the police has been brutal in dealing with the Maoist movement and that their leader was killed in cold blood.
“On one side state forces have been arming villagers and supporting armed movement of splinter groups and on the other hand, they are targeting Maoist leaders who have been fighting for the poor and the peasants,” he said. The Bihar state committee has also asked their Jharkhand counterpart to join the bandh to protest the encounter of Bokaro in which one of their cadres was killed and a woman cadre was arrested. Soon after the Jamui encounter, Maoists had gathered at Dandra forests on the foothills of Jhumra hill, under Gomia block of Bokaro district.

Last Monday, five companies of CRPF and CoBRA and a unit of district police raided the jungles in which one of the Maoist cadres was killed and Lal Muni Hansda, a wanted woman cadre was arrested. Sources said that the Santosh Yadav group had assembled in Jhumra region after the Jamui incident to decide further course of action and a recruitment camp was also underway. “Our call for a bandh is to demonstrate solidarity with the family members of our cadres who were killed in an encounter. We want villagers to understand how the state forces have been pushing them to danger by arming various groups in the villages,” Avinashji said asking peasants, labourers, transport workers and people in mass movement to join hands.