The 15 men who were abducted by suspected Maoists five days ago in Bihar’s southern Jamui district were released unharmed inside a jungle on Saturday midnight, prompting the state police to claim that a heightened police and paramilitary crackdown had made it possible.
Deendayal, one of the men released somewhere inside the Batia forest in Jamui, said the captors kept changing their locations in the five days. “They forced us to keep walking all the time inside the forest for all the five days, making us walk hundreds of kilometres. We have no idea how our release was made possible,” he said.
The release of the 15 men, all engaged in the construction of a bridge over the Bharnar river by a private construction company, brought relief to their distraught families on Saturday. But they were yet to be reunited with their families as the police officials were interrogating them in Jamui’s Sono police station to know exactly who had abducted them from the construction site on October 31 night and why.
“These 15 people were abducted certainly for ransom. There is no doubt over this. Sustained police pressure by combing operations made their safe release possible. We are interrogating the released men and probing the whole incident,” said Bihar director-general of police Abhayanand.
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Congress MLA questions Goa hosting IFFI
age Correspondent
Panaji, Nov. 5
“The government has not made even `5 out of Iffi in the last five years, yet it spends hundreds of crores on the film festival. There is no need for Goa to host Iffi,” local Congress MLA Dayanand Narvekar has said.
This year’s edition of the International Film Festival of India (Iffi) has come under a lot of flak lately and Mr Narvekar’s comments added oil to the fire.
Last week, the Catholic Church had objected to the film festival being held from November 23 to December 3 as the closing ceremony was coinciding with the feat of St. Francis Xavier, Goa’s patron saint. Lakhs of people attend the feast from all over the country and with the added burden of Iffi, pilgrims would be greatly inconvenienced, the church had maintained.
“The feast of St. Francis Xavier is celebrated by all communities on December 3, and holding the Iffi closing ceremony would inconvenience Goan,” said Mr Narvekar, adding, “The government should either pre-pone or postpone the closing ceremony.” Mr Narvekar added that Iffi had never brought any revenue for the government.