Bihar was jolted by a wave of Maoist violence on Monday — a day before the penultimate phase of Assembly polls for 35 seats — as two policemen were killed while defusing a powerful can bomb planted by the rebels in Gaya. Three TV journalists covering the bomb disposal and two other policemen received injuries. Leftwing rebels of the CPI (Maoist) outfit, who observed their daylong nationwide shutdown ostensibly to protest US President Barack Obama’s ongoing India visit, blew up a part of the railway tracks in Muzaffarpur district, causing a goods train to derail, and torched two mobile phone towers in Aurangabad on Sunday night. The Maoists also burnt four trucks in Gaya.
In somewhat a real version of the tragic blast scene in Oscar-winning film The Hurt Locker, a 10-kg can bomb planted by the Maoists on the premises of the Banke Bazar block office in Sherghati subdivision of Gaya district exploded just when the bomb disposal squad was working to defuse it.
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2 killed in Orissa
Akshaya Kumar Sahoo
Bhubaneswar
Nov. 8: Maoists cadres, who on Monday observed a 24-hour state-wide bandh, indulged in violence in Orissa killing at least two persons in Nowrangpur district and destroying a school building in Malkangiri.