Jharkhand: Maoist blow up railway tracks; protest amendment of Land Acquistion Act

Train services in the Gomoh-Gaya section of East Central Railway were disrupted as suspected CPI (Maoist) ultras blew up railway tracks on Thursday during the Jharkhand bandh called by them to protest the amendment in Land Acquisition Act, railway officials said.

The track was blown up on the Jamunia river bridge between Gomoh-Telo station under Dhanbad division of East Central Railway, they said.

Due to the incident, several trains were delayed including Howrah-New Delhi Rajdhani express, Tata-Amritsar Express, Ranchi-Mumbai Lokmanya Tilak express, Delhi-bound Samparkranti express, Gomoh-Barkakana passenger and Gomoh-Barwadih, Railway Traffic Inspector Vikas Kumar said. Later, the track was repaired and traffic returned to normal.

Meanwhile, the bandh had a mixed response in the mineral-rich Kolhan region comprised of East and West Singhbhum and Seraikela-Kharswan districts. While shops and market in Naxal-stronghold areas were closed, road traffic was also thin, police said. However, no untoward incident was reported from any part of the region as yet and the railway services was normal, police said.