Bolangir: A day after the 24-hour district bandh called by lawyers seeking a High Court bench in Bolangir, the joint action committee and district bar association Tuesday decided to intensify their agitation.
The agitating lawyers launched a separate strike calling for closure of all civil courts, collectorate, tehsil offices and sub-registrar office for a week beginning Tuesday. The agitators picketed outside the civil courts and other offices and staged sit-ins in a bid to paralyse administration.
The protestors comprising lawyers, residents and social activists led by Lalit Kumar Nayak, president of joint action committee, and Ashok Kumar Mohanty, president of district bar association, joined sit-in protests at the collectorate and other offices. They warned of six more days’ agitation demanding establishment of a High Court bench at Bolangir.
The agitation paralysed official work in the civil court and the collectorate as the protesters picketed outside the civil court.
The judges who had arrived at the court had to return due to the picketing by the protestors.
Advocates Subhranshu Sekhar Mishra, Jagannath Acharya, Anand Panigrahi, Pramod Kumar Tripathy, Ratan Kumar Moharana, Nityananda Barei, Lingaraj Padhi, Rajendra Mishra, Amaresh Tripathy and Gopaljee Panigrahi picketed outside the collectorate .
They alleged the state government has been trying to create dissensions among the people of Western Odisha with its ambiguous recommendations even as the Yashwant Singh commission report clearly identified Bolangir as the venue for the High Court bench.
The agitators demanded that the state government and the Centre take immediate steps on their demand failing which they warned of intensifying their movement in the coming days.
PNN
