Maoists blast rail track in Bihar, trains disrupted

PATNA/KOLKATA - Train traffic was disrupted as Maoists blew up a railway track in Bihar’s Jamui district early Sunday to enforce a 72-hour long strike called by them to protest a proposed security operation against the rebels, officials said. Rail services were affected in West Bengal as well.

The guerrillas blasted a track near Narganjo station in Jamui, about 170 km from here. Narganjo is situated on the Patna-Howrah rail route of the East Central Railway.

“Maoists blew up the railway track to enforce their strike starting Saturday midnight,” a police official in Jamui said.

A railway official in the district said the blast disrupted rail traffic on the route and repair work was under way.

“Over half a dozen long route express trains were halted at different railway stations after the incident,” the official said.

A railway official in Kolkata said two feet of the up line and four feet of the down line have been damaged. The overhead wire on the up line was hanging while that on the down line has been severed.

Eighteen long distance trains, many of them Kolkata-bound, have been detained at various stations.

The strike call by Maoists evoked a mixed response in Bihar as urban areas remained unaffected but normal life was hit in villages.

An official in the home department said the Maoists’ strike call evoked no response in Patna, Gaya, Muzaffarpur, Bhagalpur and Purnea but affected life in Aurangabad, Jehanabad, Arwal and Gaya districts that are considered Maoist strongholds.

The strike has been called ahead of a scheduled Feb 9 meeting in Kolkata between Home Minister P. Chidambaram and chief ministers of West Bengal, Orissa, Jharkhand and Bihar to work out a comprehensive strategy for inter-state joint operations in rebel strongholds.