By IANS
Patna : Five officials were transferred after two people were killed in Kahalgaon town of Bihar’s Bhagalpur district Saturday when police opened fired on a crowd that was protesting the death of three in police firing the day before.
The government announced compensation of Rs.100,000 each to the victims of police firing and transferred five officials including the officer in charge of the Kahalgaon police station.
On Friday morning, hundreds had gathered outside the National Thermal Power Corp (NTPC) plant in Kahalgaon, about 150 km from here, protesting an acute power shortage.
Three people were killed and at least 20 injured when police opened fire on the crowd. Police claimed they fired after some protesters attacked them.
Hundreds of people took to the streets Saturday to protest the killings. They set ablaze a vehicle of a hospital, blocked roads and pelted stones on policemen deployed in the town to control the situation.
Police opened fire and two people were killed.
The residents said they were staging a peaceful protest against the killing of three people and frequent power outages when police opened fire without any provocation.
A large number of security personnel, including Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) personnel, were deployed in the town to prevent further escalation of violence.
“The situation has gone out of control after reports of fresh deaths in police firing,” a senior district administration official said earlier.
All the injured, including police officials, were rushed to hospitals.
Chief Minister Nitish Kumar directed Principal Home Secretary Afzal Amanullah and Additional Director General of Police (Headquarters) Abyanand to rush to Kahalgaon and stay there till normalcy was returned.
“Both Afzal Amanullah and Abyanand along with the Bhagalpur district magistrate and the superintendent of police are camping (in Kahalgaon) to control the situation by negotiating with protestors,” a source in the home department said.
Nitish Kumar held a meeting of his cabinet colleagues and top officials to discuss the situation.
Acute power shortages have sparked protests in many parts of the state. Electricity offices have been ransacked in at least two dozen districts in the last few weeks.
According to energy department officials, at present the state needs 1,500-1,600 MW of power. Though the central allocation is 1,170 MW, the state has so far received 700-800 MW from the central pool.
Faced with severe power crisis and violent protests, Bihar Energy Minister Bijendra Prasad Yadav sent a strongly worded letter to the central government earlier this month, alleging discrimination against the states not ruled by the United Progressive Alliance (UPA).
In the letter, the minister accused the union government of allotting an additional 40 MW of power to Jharkhand, ignoring Bihar’s demand.
The current situation seems to have given fresh ammunition to all political parties as the ruling Janata Dal-United (JD-U) blames the central government and the opposition parties attack the state government.
JD-U activists here burnt the effigy of the UPA government for failing to resolve the power crisis in the state, while the activists of the Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD), the major opposition party in Bihar, burnt an effigy of the chief minister.
State Congress president Sadanand Singh has demanded a judicial inquiry into the Kahalgaon killings.
“The Congress has demanded a judicial probe and adequate compensation to the kin of the five victims,” Sadanand Singh told IANS over telephone from Kahalgaon.
Singh hails from Kahalgaon and has represented it in the past.
Shyam Rajak, who served as power minister when the RJD was in power, said the state had received an additional 90 MW from the central pool due to party chief Lalu Prasad’s efforts.
Bihar Urban Development Minister Ashwani Kumar Chaubey, who is from Bhagalpur, blamed the RJD and the Congress for violence in Kahalgaon.