Gangsters on prowl in Katihar villages

23 Apr, 2007

PATNA: Manihari, along with Amdabad block, in Katihar district is famous on the state's cultural map as the birthplace of two famous novelists Satinath Bhaduri and Balai Chandra Ghosh alias Bonophool, also for that poignantly moving song from Bimal Roy's film "Bandini" "O mere manjhi abki bar le chal par, mere sajana hain us par" that was shot with cine stars Nutan and Ashok Kumar on the

"ghatgari" at the Manihari ferry ghat. Of late, this idyllic atmosphere of Amdabad block, its numerous villages and Kala diara lies scarred by the activities of the fast emerging gangster Babloo Yadav from Kisanpur village.

On the fateful night of April 19, he, along with two other gangsters, force-lifted two Dalit teenaged girls Ranjana and Sanjana (names changed) from their houses in Kisanpur village, raped them, and then abandoned the two in distraught conditions. Their father Lakshman Ram, also from Kisanpur village in Amdabad block, was shell-shocked by the incident.

There was every indication that even this misdeed of Yadav and his accomplices would go unrecorded, and perpetrators of the outrage unpunished. But the two victims mustered courage and lodged the FIR in Amadabad police station on April 20, reports reaching here said. The same day, the jawans of the SAP moved in, and helped by the in-charge of Amdabad police station, caught one of the named accused Prakash Yadav at Manihari, the reports said. The people of the entire area are in an agitated mood.

It is like they have been crying enough is enough," said Pushpraj Singh alias Chhote of Guagachhi village. Irate villagers, along with the rape victims and their father, have decided to appear in the "Janata Durbar" of chief minister Nitish Kumar to apprise him of the prevailing situation that has been brought to bear on them by Babloo Yadav. Both Nitish and deputy chief minister Sushil Kumar Modi are held in high esteem in the area, the former as its benefactor and the latter as the one who visited the inaccessible villages, knocked at the doors, and shared water with them during electioneering.

"The erosion caused by the Ganga since 1984, devoured villages, railway lines and bridges, and also displaced people. Amdabad would have remained cut off if Nitish had not intervened. "He, as the railway minister, sanctioned the re-construction of Tejnarainpur railway station and laying of the railway lines to re-link it with Katihar via Manihari," Chhote said. "Otherwise," he added, "there is no electricity. Our petition for power connection is still unattended." What is galling is the ignominy of bearing with the antics of Babloo Yadav.