lamau September 24, 2007
| Three persons, including a policeman, were killed and railway tracks and a station blasted today as widespread violence marred a 24-hour general strike called by CPI(Maoist) in Bihar and adjacent Jharkhand to protest the arrest of its leaders. |
| Hundreds of heavily armed ultras set ablaze six trucks and two buses on the Grand Trunk Road and seven trucks at another place in Gaya district, police sources said. |
| When the police reached the spot on the Grand Trunk Road, an encounter broke out in which a policeman, Shanker Singh, was killed. A private bus driver, Kameswar Rai, and helper Surajdeo Yadav also died in the cross-fire, the sources said. |
| Another injured truck driver Satynarain Yadav was hospitalised in Gaya where his condition was stated to be critical. |
| The naxalites took some passengers of a bus hostage while retreating, but freed them later, the sources said. |
| A report from Palamau in Jharkhand said the ultras blew up a 50-metre stretch of the railway track at Pahleja on the Mughalsarai-Gaya section in the neighbouring Rohtas district, disrupting movement of trains for over five hours, railway sources said. |
| National highways in Aurangabad, Gaya and Rohtas districts, where the Naxalites have a base, were deserted as private bus and truck operators stayed off the roads. |
| Railway sources said the Naxalites damaged the Kajarat Nawadih railway station on the Garwah Road-Sonenagar railway route under Mughalsarai in the Naxal-hit Palamu district, by exploding can bombs after employees were evacuated. |
| They also damaged the rail track at Chengro on the Dhanbad-Gaya section. |
