(Rptg, changing slug)

New Delhi, Mar 15 (UNI) The politically cornered CPI(M) today maintained its support to the administration for its action in yesterday's firing in Nandigram.

The party's Polit Bureau said that for the past two and a half months, five gram panchayats in Block I of Nandigram had been out of bounds for the administration. Certain elements had resorted to violence and cut off roads and bridges in the area on the pretext of land acquisition.

Two thousand and five hundred people, including CPI(M) members and supporters, were driven out of the area. More than a thousand people were sheltering in relief camps outside the area. Even after the government categorically declared that no land was being acquired in Nandigram, the Trinamool, naxalite and other elements refused to allow the administration or police to enter the area.

Those who did not go along with their disruptive activities were targeted. Only a few days ago, a woman, Sumita Mandal, was raped and killed, the CPI(M) Polit Bureau said in a statement.

Repeated efforts to have meetings for restoring peace were rebuffed with these parties and elements refusing to attend them.

Finally, after an all-Party meeting, which was boycotted by the Trinamool Congress, a decision was taken that the administration must reestablish its authority and peace be restored in the area.

The statement said that the police entered Nandigram to see that the roads, culverts and bridges were repaired and the administration restored. However, they were attacked by bombs and pipe guns.

The party expressed its regret that lives had been lost in police firing but at the same time, denounced ''the organised elements who utilised bombs and pipe guns on the police'' and said these elements had to take the blame.

Polit bureau - the highest policy making body of CPI(M) appealed to the people of West Bengal and, in particular, Nandigram and East Midnapur district to stand unitedly against such disruptive forces.

UNI