By IANS,
Bhopal : Several people were injured, some of them critically, when police resorted to baton charge on the agitators who had called a shutdown in Madhya Pradesh’s Seoni district to protest the shifting of a four-lane road to another district in the state.
The agitators were opposing the shifting of the four lane road passing through the city to Chhindwara – a constituency represented by Union Road Transport Minister Kamal Nath.
“The construction work of the road under the project has been stopped for the past few days even though 70 percent of the work on this project has been completed. It has been done so because Nath wants to construct the highway through the neighbouring Chhindwara district,” an agitator alleged.
When the blocking of the national highway No. 7 caused serpentine queues of vehicles on both sides of the highway and road contact with other districts including Narsinghpur, Chhindwara, Mandla and Jabalpur was snapped, police tried to forcibly remove the agitators. A clash ensued.
The agitation was held under the aegis of ‘Janmanch’ which was constituted Thursday by the local citizens of Seoni and politicians to protest the union minister’s alleged move and stage a shutdown.
Janmanch claimed it had the support of commercial establishments, lawyers, chemists, traders, teachers, transporters and politicians cutting across party lines.
All commercial establishments, markets, government offices, academic institutes and all small shops also remained closed.