Anand ST Das By

Express News Service

PATNA: A group of Maoists dragged a schoolteacher from his house and shot him dead outside his village in Jharkhand’s Bokaro district on Friday night.

The left wing rebels also set afire a mobile phone tower.

The victim, Kalicharan Mahto, in his late 40s, was killed apparently because the Maoists suspected him of being a police informer. The incident took place in Tiskopi village under Chatrochatti police station area in Gomia block, said police.

“Nearly 50 armed Maoists reached Mahto’s house and interrogated him, his wife and their teenage son for about an hour. They wanted to take Mahto and his son with them, but took only Mahto as his wife asked them to spare their son,” said a police official. Half an hour after Mahto left with the rebels, the sound of gunshots was heard. Villagers gathered the site an hour later and saw a profusely bleeding Mahto lying dead.

Before leaving the village, the Maoists set afire a mobile phone tower and threw several handbills in the area. The handwritten pamphlets warned the state government of severe consequences unless the recent MoUs signed with multinational corporations are cancelled, said police.

Hariaudh Karmali, the SHO of Chatrochatti police station, said raids were being conducted in nearby villages to nab the Maoists who murdered the schoolteacher.

The Maoists are currently observing a protest week (from May 25 to 31) in Jharkhand and have called for a daylong statewide shutdown in protest against what they call the state government’s “pro-capitalist, anti-poor” activities.

The schoolteacher’s murder is the third violent incident perpetrated by the leftwing rebels in Gomia block in the past three days. The rebels had set afire the Dumri Bihar railway station and the engine of a goods train there on Thursday night.

In a separate incident, three Maoists belonging to the Janmukti Morcha outfit were arrested at McCluskieganj in Jharkhand’s Ranchi district on Saturday. Police raided a hideout of the Maoists after getting a tip-off and managed to arrest three of the six who had assembled there, said Ranchi SSP Kuldeep Dwivedi. The arrested Maoists were identified as Ritesh Kumar Thapa, Sunil Turi and Mohammad Zulfikar. A country-made gun, three live cartridges and pamphlets of the Maoist outfit were recovered from the arrested rebels, said police.