http://sify.com/news/fullstory.php?id=14674022
Six killed in WB rural poll violence
By a Sify Correspondent
Thursday, 15 May , 2008, 00:03
Kolkata: A wave of violence unleashed by the ruling
CPI-M in West Bengal claimed at least six lives and
injured scores on Wednesday during the panchayat
elections with three dead belonging to the RSP- its
junior partner in the government.
The wife of a candidate was among the three dead at
Basanti in South 24 Parganas district, officials said,
while five died statewide.
Police officials said three people, including a woman,
died in the shooting and many injured by alleged CPI-M
men who also set on fire several thatched houses to
terrorise the voters. "We have reports of three death
in Basanti. One of them is a woman," West Bengal
Inspector General of Police (Law and Order) Raj
Kanojia said.
Also in the news: 'Terrorists failed to create
communal disturbances' | When blasts rocked the Pink
City | Special
West Bengal Public Works Department (PWD) minister
Kshiti Goswami said the dead belonged to his party,
the Revolutionary Socialist Party (RSP) and the
assailants were his government's major constituent
Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPI-) supporters.
A CPI(M) supporter was also killed in a separate poll
related violence in the same Basanti area. In another
incident at Domjur in Howrah district a youth was
killed when the bomb he was carrying went off, Kanojia
said.
As incidents of violence were reported from few other
areas, a two-month-old child died at Panchla in Howrah
district after bombs were hurled near a polling
station where his mother was standing in a queue. The
child reportedly fell down from the lap of her mother
and was trampled by other people — all running for
cover.
The second of the three-phased panchayat (local bodies
to rule the villages) polls, crucial for the ruling
Left Front led by the pro-industry Chief Minister
Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee to gauge its eroding rural
support base, began on a violent note on Wednesday.
TV footage by a local Kolkata TV channel showed
bullet-ridden bodies of men and women lying at Talda
village in Basanti of South 24 Parganas district,
about 75 km from Kolkata.
Rampada Haldar, an RSP candidate, was in a critical
condition while his wife Laxmi Haldar was shot dead,
officials said.
Wails of village women rented the air as RSP, a
disgruntled partner of the Left Front which is at
loggerheads with main constituent CPI-M over the
takeover of farmlands for industry, claimed that CPI-M
was out to grab rural seats by force.
Meanwhile, reports of clashes and bombings between the
CPI-M and its rival Trinamool Congress led by the
feisty Mamata Banerjee also poured from other areas.
Police said two persons, including the child, were
killed when CPI-M and Trinamool Congress workers
hurled crude bombs at each other in Panchla area of
Howrah near Kolkata.
Polling in Singur, the scene of unrest over farmland
takeover for world's cheapest car Nano to be
manufactured by Tata Motors, was peaceful.
The third round of polling will take place on May 18,
while counting will be on May 21.
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