BJP’s Buxar bandh call evokes mixed response

Kumar RajivNayan

Buxar :  The Buxar bandh called by the BJP on March 16, 2017, evoked mixed response. The bandh was called by the BJP in protest against assault on its workers allegedly by police during their agitation for power about a week back. The bandh supporters led by their MP Ashwini Choubey and a senior BJP leader Pradeep Dubey took out a procession in the morning that passed through the main thoroughfares of the town and forced the businessmen and traders to down their shutters.

Due to bandh, almost all the business establishments, schools, colleges remained closed. Attendance in government offices and in court too was thin and vehicles remained off the road till afternoon. The bandh supporters blocked the Charitravan, Ram Rekha ghat, PP road, Old Chowk, Old Sadar Hospital, Main road, Satyadeoganj, railway station road and other areas. They burnt tyres on road and raised slogans against Buxar district administration and officials of the South Bihar Power Distribution Company Limited (SBPDCL).

Ashwini Choubey, in  a communication the Speaker, Lok Sabha, has requested him to take action against the Executive Engineer, SBPDCL, Buxar DM and the SP for misbehaving with him. He also sent a memorandum to the Union Home Minister, the President of India, and Bihar Governor in this regard.

Choubey complained that a delegation led by Buxar district BJP president Rana Pratap Singh had gone to the office of the Executive Engineer, SBPDCL, on March 10, 2017, seeking solution of power problem but found both the Executive Engineers, Project and Distribution, Santosh Yadav and Surendra Kumar and others allegedly consuming liquor and mutton there even as the state government has enforced prohibition in Bihar.

When the district BJP president Singh referred to the burnt transformer at village Chilhari for the last one month and also mentioned that the local MP Ashwini Choubey had earlier ordered to change the transformer immediately, the officials hurled volley of choicest words against the members of the delegation and the MP and also attacked and assaulted them in which the district president and four persons were injured. The injured were later admitted to Patna Medical College and Hospital. He said in the meantime police came but the officials went away firing with countrymade pistol in the air but the police did not arrest them though they seized empty bottle of liquor from the office. Since then the BJP activists are on dharna at the gate of the office of the Executive Engineer.