Here is the Telegraph report.
The Telegraph - Calcutta (Kolkata) | Frontpage |<I>Khukuri</I> slash reopens gash Cop shots kill 2, hills on fire
Sibchu, Feb. 8: A khukuri attack on a policewoman re-lit the powder keg in Darjeeling, triggering police firing in Jalpaiguri in which a teenager and a young woman supporter of Gorkhaland died and igniting a wave of arson in the hills.
The bloodletting and firebombing have not only put the hills back on the boil and muddled the tripartite talks but also reopened questions on the mob control skills of Bengal police.
The way events spun out of control today initial accounts indicated panic-fuelled firing by a police force fleeing a violent mob suggests that the law enforcement agencies had learnt few lessons from Nandigram where a flare-up in 2007 had created an unparalleled crisis for the state government.
The stand-off in Sibchu, a forest 110km from Siliguri and close to the Bhutan border, blew up this morning when over 3,000 Gorkha Janmukti Morcha supporters assembled in defiance of prohibitory orders and attacked security forces.
A confrontation has been brewing since January 19 when the Morcha had launched a long march for Gorkhaland, charting a course that would have taken supporters of a new state through the Dooars that houses groups opposed to the proposal.
Since Adivasis in the Dooars are not known to back Gorkhaland, the administration had prevented the Morcha from marching past Sibchu. Yesterday, security forces had removed a tent camp there.
However, this morning, Morcha supporters returned to Sibchu, cut trees and laid them across the road a tactic put to effective use in Nandigram by land acquisition protesters to block the security forces.
Reinforcements 300 police and CRPF personnel reached the spot around 10.30am. Officials asked the crowd to disperse since Section 144, which prevents assembly, was in force. After a last warning went unheeded at 11.35am, the police burst tear gas shells and baton-charged the crowd that split into three groups and scattered. The police then chased out from the community hall a group on hunger strike.
The security forces seemed to have made an error of judgement after this and underestimated the resolve of the crowd. A little over half an hour later, the protesters re-converged from three sides and attacked the police.
One person slashed at constable Kalyani Tiggas head with a khukuri. As blood streamed down Kalyanis head, a policeman standing near her opened fire. The shot hit a teenager, not the attacker, standing nearby.
The battle intensified then and the police started fleeing, according to witnesses. However, seeing some of their colleagues being hit by stones and bleeding, a few policemen turned around and fired six more rounds. The 24-year-old woman was killed in this fresh round of firing.
The Morcha identified the dead as Bimala Rai from Kalimpong and 16-year-old Vicky Lama from Rangamati in Malbazar. The police, however, said those killed were yet to be identified.
Inspector-general of police, north Bengal, Ranveer Kumar said: They hacked our lady constable, Kalyani Tigga, with a khukuri on her head and the police had to fire in self-defence. The police were also fired upon from an improvised firearm which was seized from the spot.
He said the subdivisional police officer of Malbazar, Arindam Sarkar, and the officer in charge of the Malbazar police station, B.D. Sarker, were among those seriously injured by stones thrown by the protesters.
Kumar said Wilson Champromari, the Morcha-backed Independent MLA of Kalchini, was arrested from the spot. Two mobile phones and Rs 22,000 were seized from him.
He was among those who incited the violence against the police, the inspector-general said.
While being led to a police van, Wilson claimed he had been leading a peaceful agitation. We want to take Bimal Gurung to the Dooars and we were on a peaceful movement. We were attacked brutally by the police and the hunger-strikers were chased and beaten out of the community hall. I was also badly beaten up.
Soon after, Morcha supporters struck at several places in their strongholds in Darjeeling, Kalimpong and Kurseong, targeting government establishments and burning down some buildings, including at least one in the Mall. A judges parked car was also set on fire.
The Morcha has called an indefinite strike from 6am tomorrow to protest the firing. At 4pm, shopkeepers who had downed shutters on their own were asked to reopen so that people could stock up on essentials. Tourists not too many are around in the lean season used the window to leave Darjeeling.
Late tonight, Morcha president Bimal Gurung asked people to stop destroying property, remain calm and maintain peace.