Even as the Bihar Police step up operations to choke Naxal revenue, Intelligence sources claim the ultras have been making over Rs 70 crore per year only from opium cultivation in the “red zone” — Aurangabad, Nawada, Gaya, Jamui in Bihar and Chatra and Palamau in Jharkhand — where poor farmers are being forced to grow the banned substance, used to make expensive spurious drugs.
The
war between the Kurmi-Koiris and the Mahadalits (Musahars) that left 16
persons dead in north Bihar’s Khagaria district has apparently created
a piquant situation for chief minister Nitish Kumar. The
victims belong to Kurmi-Koiri communities, which constitute the nucleus
of Nitish’s political strength. And the perpetrators are Mahadalits
(lowly among the Scheduled Castes) whom Nitish has been trying to win
over by initiating several developmental measures for them.
The arrest of a sacked Army sepoy Sudhanshu Sudhakar from Patna for his alleged links with
Pakistan's ISI on Monday rekindled the memory of 1994 when for the first time in the state nine ISI operatives were arrested in Bhagalpur. Not only this, Sudhakar's arrest has also raised fresh fears of ISI operation in the state.
Poverty and hunger forced an elderly couple in a Bihar village to
commit suicide, villagers said Sunday. However, a local official
maintained the couple died of cancer but was unable to explain how the
deaths occurred at the same time.
Farm labourers Inderdeo Mahto and his wife Kari Devi, both in their 60s
and residents of Khushalpur village in Gaya district, allegedly
consumed poison Saturday after going without food for days as they
found no work since early July, villagers claimed. The village is about
100 km from Patna.
In view of the steep decline in the numbers of vultures, the state government government has decided to check the use of
anti-inflammatory Diclofenac medicine in treatment of animals as the
drug accumulates in the tissues of carcasses and is leading to the
death of vultures, which is now mainly spotted in the districts of Bhagalpur.
BIHAR THIS WEEK 
