Adivasis call bandh in Jharkhand against Assam tribal killings

The dawn-to-dusk Jharkhand bandh called by Adivasi Sengel (Empowerment) Abhiyan (ASA) on Wednesday in protest against the killing of tribals by Bodo militants in Assam, passed peacefully here even as normal life remained unaffected by it.

ASA has called for bandh in Assam, Bengal, Odisha and Jharkhand against the killing of tribals by Bodo militants in Kokrajhar and Sonitpur district of Assam recently.

ASA supporters took out a procession in the tribal- dominated Karandih on the outskirts of the steel city here and torched the effigy of Assam Chief Minister Tarun Gogoi to lodge their protest, ASA president Salkhan Murmu said.

A similar protest, he said, was also observed in tribal- dominated districts of Jamtara, Dumka and Bokaro, where too the effigy of Gogoi was burnt. Murmu claimed that the bandh evoked a good response in Bengal, where ASA activists blocked road and rail traffic at several places.

Meanwhile, the district administration here has made elaborate security arrangements to maintain law and order during the bandh.