Locals defied the banda in Mustang demanding that the district be declared peace zone due to its religious and tourist value. Some Maoist cadres tried to shut down the market from early Monday morning but gave in after people from every household came forward to defy the strike. [break]
“There has not been any untoward incident so far. We want Mustang to be never affected by banda called by any political party,” Preisdent of Kuthang Mother Group Mohan Kumari Sherchan said. “We got the market and hotels opened to ensure that no negative message spreads outside about this tourism hub,” Sherchan reasoned.
There were minor scuffles during the defiance of banda. The Maoist padlocked Janahit Higher Secondary School in Jomsom Monday after the banda was completely defied on Sunday. Maoists claim two of their cadres were injured during the scuffle with locals attempting to open the school.
“Cadres of Nepali Congress and CPN-UML came out to defy the banda after mothers groups took lead,” said Chief District Officer (CDO) Umesh Kumar Dhakal. Transportation and market remain unaffected while schools conducted classes Monday.
“This district itself is saintly and no untoward incident happened after the mother group, civil society and political parties agreed to defy the banda. Everything is running normally,” CDO Dhakal said.
Locals thrash YCL cadre in Dharan
YCL member Praveen Rai was injured in Dharan Monday after local youths retaliated against the Maoists, who were snatching motorcycle keys, according to our correspondent Rohit Rai.
There was a scuffle between Maoist cadres and a youth at Zero Point, Dharan-13 early in the morning while the former tried to stop a motorcycle. The youth later returned with others to retaliate and Rai sustained head injury from a stone pelted by the defying public. Meanwhile, police arrested two Maoist cadres from Singha Devi Chowk, Dharan-1 in the morning after disputes with local youths while stopping motorcycles. Area Police Post Dharan said Sunsari President of All Nepal National Independent Students´ Union (Revolutionary) Prahlad Raut and Maoist Area Committee Member Kumar Raut were detained and released an hour later to avert clash with the banda defying youths.
Arrested Raut, however, claimed the police used obscenities and thrashed them after they slammed the police for not intervening while the youths were beating them.
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