SUBHASH MISHRA
Dhanbad Aug 12: Political parties and their student’s wings called off their six-day-old agitation today after the state government transferred Dhanbad SDM Surendra Kumar.
Bhartiya Janta Party (BJP), Marxist Coordination Committee (MCC) of Arup Chatterjee, AJSU, Akhil Bhartiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP), Bhartiya Yuva Morcha ( BYM), and Jharkhand Chhatra Sangh had been staging a dharna at Randhir Verma Chowk since August 7 for sacking the SDM for lathi-charging intermediate failed girl students.
“Though the ABVP’s demand was to sack the SDM, the state government removed him from Dhanbad having seen public sentiment. So, the ABVP has called off agitation from today,” said Rajiv Ranjan, organizing secretary. Several ABVP activists had also been injured in lathi-charge.
On August 6 girl students had gone to meet Health Minister Banna Gupta at the collectorate over Jharkhand Academic Council (JAC) intermediate result where the police under the SDM beat up them with lathis. Six students got injured in the lathi charge.
Besides the opposition parties, Congress MLAs Purnima Singh (Jharia) and Amba Prasad (Barkagaon) had also demanded action against the SDM who had allegedly beat the girls.
Taking the police action seriously the health minister had sought a report from the deputy commissioner (DC). District Cong president Brajendra Singh had set up a six-member probe committee to recommend action.
BJP state president Deepak Prakash had also sent a probe committee under senior leader CP Singh, MLA, to Dhanbad. The committee had held the SDM guilty for resorting to lathicharge on girl students.
MCC and CPI (ML) jointly under former Nirsa MLA Arup Chatterjee had also been agitating for the removal of the SDM.
