CAA row: Protests continue in West Bengal; Internet to remain suspended in Howrah

Kolkata, Dec 17: Protests were reported from some parts of West Bengal for the fifth day on Tuesday against the amended Citizenship Act. Agitators raised slogans against the new Citizenship Act at Basirhat in North 24 Parganas district. The police has stepped up vigil across the state and as many as 354 protesters were arrested for violence.

Several trains to north Bengal were either cancelled or delayed, officials said. West Bengal Chief Minister and TMC supremo Mamata Banerjee is scheduled to lead a rally from Jadavpur 8B bus stand to Bhawanipore in south Kolkata area against the citizenship law.

Banerjee, who led a mega rally from Red Road to Jorasanko Thakur Bari, the ancestral house of Nobel laureate Rabindranath Tagore in north Kolkata on Monday, had urged the agitators to not indulge in vandalism and arson.

The chief minister had declared on Monday that the Amended Citizenship Act and the National Register of Citizensh could be enforced in the state only over her "dead body".

Road and rail blockades were witnessed in the state on Monday as violent protests over the contentious Citizenship Act refused to die down, amid warning by state authorities and appeal from the chief minister. Anti-citizenship law protests snowballed into a major flashpoint in West Bengal on Monday with highways and railway lines blocked and incidents of arson and loot reported from many places.

Meanwhile, in a major boost to the civil rights movement, the state government withdrew activities related to the National Population Register (NPR) on Monday. The notice issued by the Census Cell of the Home and Hill Affairs Department automatically revokes an earlier order when the government departments were instructed to list the names of junior officials to compile the NPR.