Family members mourn the death of their loved ones in the village. Picture by Deepak Kumar

Patna, Dec. 30: In an alleged retaliatory strike, Naxalites killed four farmers of Paliganj block in Patna district last night.

Sources said an armed squad of the Communist Party of India (Maoist) surrounded Mauri village in the evening and opened fire on two men who were working in a field. The two villagers, Dharmendra and Vilas Sharma, died on the spot.

The squad then entered the village and resorted to indiscriminate firing, which the villagers tried to resist by taking up arms. The shootout, which lasted for hours, claimed the lives of two villagers and injured several others. There was no casualty among the squad members.

The Naxalites are also believed to have damaged two houses and set fire to some tractors in the village.

According to sources, the villagers allegedly owed allegiance to the Ranvir Sena, the upper caste private army. ?The incident appears to be in retaliation to the killing of PW (People?s War) area commander Siyaram Manjhi in November,? state director-general of police Narayan Mishra said.

Activists of the erstwhile PW, which merged with the Maoist Communist Centre to form the CPI (Maoist), suspected that some Ranvir Sena member of Mauri was responsible for Manjhi?s death, sources said.

As the villagers try to come to terms with the tragedy that struck them last night, some allege that the police have not taken prompt action to arrest the attackers for fear of the Naxalites.

?The police visited the spot only when the squad was returning and they seemed to fire a few rounds half-heartedly,? a local source said, adding that the shootout between the villagers and the squad lasted for hours.

Senior superintendent of police N.H. Khan, who camped at the spot today, said the district police have swung into action to arrest the culprits. A battalion of the CRPF has also been deployed in the area, which remained tense today.

?Our immediate concern is to dispose of the bodies. Then, we will catch the attackers,? Khan said. Sources said the villagers did not allow the police to remove the bodies for quite some time.

The BJP called yesterday?s incident a ?political massacre?. ?Laloo Prasad Yadav?s Rashtriya Janata Dal has clear connections with the Naxalites. Conniving with the erstwhile PW to finish us off is nothing new for the ruling party,? a BJP source alleged here today.

The Ranvir Sena is believed to have become a spent force in the Paliganj area, which has witnessed a ?war of supremacy? between the PW and the CPI(ML).

In August, suspected PW activists attacked the local CPI(ML) office in the dead of the night and killed five party workers. A few days later, the same outfit allegedly killed two mukhias who owed allegiance to the CPI(ML), one in Patna and the other in Jehanabad.