Maoists strike ahead of Chidambaram's Kolkata meeting

Ranchi/ Patna, Feb 9 (ANI): Ahead of Union Home Minister P Chidambaram's meeting in Kolkata to discuss strategies to counter Maoists threat, in an audacious strike, the Naxals blew up a stretch of the railway tracks in Jharkhand's Giridih district on the third day of the 72-hour shutdown call given by them on Sunday across the four states of Jharkhand, Orissa, Bihar and West Bengal.

Police sources said the tracks were blown up under Nimiaghat police station in the district, adding that the trains on this section have been stopped on both up and down lines.

There are reports that the Naxals blasted the Howrah-Delhi line at the Narganjo railway station in Bihar. Earlier on Sunday, a railway official was killed and a railway track was blown up at the same place.

A government middle school in Khunti district of Jharkhand has also been blown up by the Naxalites. (ANI)