Suspected Maoist rebels blew up a train station and a wedding hall and torched more than a dozen vehicles in eastern India Tuesday, police said. No casualties were reported in the two attacks. The violence erupted on the second day of an indefinite strike called by the rebels to protest the alleged arrest of two of their senior leaders. The guerrillas have fought for more than three decades demanding land and jobs for farmers and the poor. About 2,000 people- including police, militants and civilians - have been killed over the past few years. About 100 suspected insurgents raided a village in Aurangabad district of Bihar state and blew up a building used for weddings, said state police official Neelmani, who uses one name. In Orissa state, 20 suspected rebels blew up a railroad station and torched 15 vehicles on a highway in Sundargarh district, said R.K. Bal, a superintendent of police. Suspected insurgents also abducted three railway workers but freed them hours later unharmed, Bal said. The rebels, formally known as the Communist Party of India, said in a statement the strike would continue until their two leaders were released. The strike was called in five Indian states Jharkhand, Bihar, Chhattisgarh, Orissa and West Bengal. The rebels are called Naxalites after Naxalbari, a village in West Bengal state where the movement was born in 1967.
