Chhattisgarh villagers take three power firm officials hostages

RAIPUR - Nearly 250 villagers in Chhattisgarh’s Raigarh district held hostage three senior officials of a private company Thursday, blackened their faces, and made them do sit-ups in the scorching 46 degrees Celsius temperature, police said.

After almost eight hours of captivity, the officials managed to escape after a strong police squad reached the village and resorted to a cane charge to disperse the mobs.

The three officials of the S.K.S. Ispat and Power Limited, Thursday morning went to Darramunda village in Raigarh district, some 220 km from Raipur, for survey work for a proposed 1,200 MW thermal power plant project. The team was led by general manager (projects) K. Hariharan, sources here at the police headquarters told IANS.

The officials went to the village to hold talks with the villagers about the project but the entire populace of around 250 took hostage of all the three officials.

“From 9 a.m. to about 5 p.m., the officials were held hostage by the villagers but managed to run away after police reached the village,” said Dhruv Gupta, the acting superintendent of police of Raigarh.

A policeman and four villagers were injured in the clash. The angry villagers protesting over the new power plant damaged three police vehicles as well.