NEW
DELHI: The Left parties, joined by regional forces like Samajwadi Party and
Telugu Desam Party, on Tuesday staged street protests to demand the roll back of
the fuel price hike as the Communists said the UPA government could not take
their support for
granted.
Barring states ruled
by the Left and Uttar Pradesh, where the ruling Samajwadi Party's workers
stopped many trains and blocked highways at several places, the protests had
little impact.
Strikes by
truckers against the price hike that coincided with the protests, however,
affected transport services in Orissa, Tripura and Madhya
Pradesh.
In Delhi, CPI-M
leaders Prakash Karat and Sitaram Yechury and CPI's A B Bardhan courted arrest
at the Parliament Street police station with a large number of Left activists.
Leaders from the Samajwadi Party, Rashtriya Lok Dal and Janata Dal-Secular were
also present.
They said the
protest was meant to mount pressure on the government to reverse its
"anti-people" decision and the issue would be raised in the UPA-Left
Coordination Committee meeting on
Wednesday.
In West Bengal, the
ruling Left Front organised sit-ins before the offices of oil
PSUs.
Normal life in Kerala,
another Left-ruled state, was paralysed by a dawn-to-dusk strike called by trade
unions. Shops and business establishments remained closed while attendance in
government offices was
thin.
Over 5,000 Left
activists, including CPI secretary D Raja, were taken into custody across Tamil
Nadu when they tried to picket Central government offices and roads.
In Uttar Pradesh, train
services were affected and minor incidents of violence reported during the
strike against the price hike. Long-distance trains were stranded as Samajwadi
Party workers squatted on the tracks and stray incidents of violence occurred
when the protestors forcibly closed down shops and businesses, police
said.
Samajwadi Party workers
also blocked roads at several places in the state, including the busy Grand
Trunk road and the Lucknow
highway.
The Telugu Desam Party
joined the CPI-M for the protests in Andhra Pradesh, holding protest rallies in
Hyderabad and several district headquarters during which their workers courted
arrest. The TDP chief and former chief minister N Chandrababu Naidu participated
in a "cycle rally" with a large number of his party
workers.
Left party workers in
Madhya Pradesh staged protests, blocked roads and burnt effigies of the UPA
government. In Bhopal, they shouted slogans against the Centre, terming the fuel
price hike as "unwanted and irrational" and demanding its total roll
back.
CPI and Samajwadi Party
workers joined the demonstrations at Guna and Gwalior, where traffic was blocked
by the protestors.
Left party
workers in Punjab and Haryana staged demonstrations and blocked traffic at
Bathinda, Ludhiana and Hoshiarpur. The Punjab Truck Operators Union also held
protest demonstrations against the fuel price hike.