The decks have been cleared for the widening of BT Road after police demolished seven unauthorised constructions in an operation that started on Sunday night.

The structures were either temples or mazhars, and were located between Kamarhati and Barrackpore.

?These constructions were the only ones that were not removed during earlier drives. There are no longer any obstacles in widening the road,? said Praveen Kumar, superintendent of police, North 24-Parganas.

Police said local residents had removed the idols and valuables kept in the structures before the drive started.

However, tension ran high at some sites during the demolition and stones and bricks were pelted at the policemen.

There were no major incidents of violence and the demolition was completed smoothly, Kumar added.

Teams of the state public works department (PWD) and the North 24-Parganas zilla parishad, along with a large number of policemen and Rapid Action Force (RAF) personnel were deployed at the demolition sites since late on Sunday night.

Senior police officers of the district were present during the operation. Local offices of political parties extended a helping hand to the cops.

According to Kumar, the operation was started at midnight and continued till 4 am on Monday. Article 144 was imposed in the area to prevent any untoward incident. The cops also put up roadblocks during the drive.

Despite the precautions, trouble broke out in Sodepur, near a cinema hall, when a group of local residents attacked policemen as they were about to demolish a temple. The group hurled stones and bricks at the cops, forcing them to start a lathicharge.

Earlier, a roadblock had been put up by residents to protest the decision to demolish a temple near Barrackpore Government High School. Some residents also went on a fast.

The agitation was withdrawn before the drive started.

A large number of people gathered on the spot as soon as demolition of the temple started. Police officers rushed to the spot to defuse the tension.

Later, the police and RAF personnel stood on guard as bulldozers razed the temple to the ground.

PWD minister Amar Chowdhury had recently promised to widen a 10-km stretch of the road, once the illegal encroachments were removed.