Patna, August 21
Stray violence and disruption of rail traffic today marred the 12-hour Bihar bandh called by NDA to demand resignation of Chief Minister Rabri Devi as police rounded up 4000 persons including the alliance’s top state leadership during the shutdown that affected normal life across the state.

The police lobbed tear gas shells at R-block near the state legislative complex to disperse bandh supporters. In Buxar, the police lathicharged a group of BJP supporters trying to forcibly enforce the bandh.

In the state capital, the windscreens of a few private vehicles were smashed by the agitators and tyres of auto-rickshaws and cycle-rickshaws were deflated.

The maverick politician, who managed to rope in opposition leaders like former Prime Minister Chandra Shekhar and CPM general secretary Harkishen Singh Surjeet at his party’s “Maha dharna” in the Capital, called for a concerted opposition effort to oust the BJP-led government “steeped in corruption and guilty of threatening the secular fabric of the nation by saffronising the education system.”

The RJD leader, who also succeeded in persuading Congress President and Leader of the Opposition in the Lok Sabha Sonia Gandhi to send her message to be read out at the dharna, made a unilateral announcement of a seat adjustment among all secular parties in the coming Assembly elections in UP to oust the BJP government there.

While the AIADMK and the CPI had also sent their parliamentary representatives to the sit-in, Mr Laloo Prasad Yadav resented the absence of Samajwadi Party leader Mulayam Singh Yadav on the occasion, saying that he had sent him a special invitation and even talked to him over the phone.

Mr Laloo Prasad Yadav said after the “successful” holding of today’s dharna, the opposition leaders would prepare a joint action programme to root out the Vajpayee Government.

Describing as a mere drama the Prime Minister’s offer of resignation in the wake of Shiv Sena MP Sanjay Nirupam’s allegations of the PMO’s involvement in the UTI scam, he said as the NDA allies sensed danger to their government they once again clung to one another forgetting their so-called concern for probity in public life.

He even accused the Vajpayee Government of deliberately setting some ordnance depots in the country on fire to finish evidence of sub-standard arms and ammunition being supplied to defence personnel.

Earlier making a brief appearance at the dharna site, former Prime Minister Chandra Shekhar congratulated Mr Laloo Yadav for organising a public protest against corruption in high places and saffronisation of education.

CPM leader Harkishen Singh Surjeet said his party would always support such protests inside Parliament as well as on the streets.