Midnapore, Nov. 16: A backlash against alleged police excesses today spiralled out of Maoist strongholds and crippled a key highway that fills Calcutta’s food basket, holding up some 400 vehicles for over six hours.

The blockade of National Highway 6, which links Calcutta and Mumbai, marked a new phase in the agitation in West Midnapore as it was carried out by non-tribals for the first time.

So far, such blockades were confined to local roads in tribal belts like Lalgarh where allegedly indiscriminate arrests, after the November 2 blast targeted at the chief minister, have triggered widespread protests.

The blockade using felled trees at Lodhashuli, around 160km from Calcutta, on NH 6 was lifted around 8.30pm after police persuasion.

The road was blocked by members of the Yuva Chhatra Kurmi Sangram Committee, an organisation of Mahatos who are concentrated in West Midnapore, Purulia and Bankura.

The protest began as an expression of solidarity with the tribals’ agitation against the alleged police atrocities but later demands such as inclusion in BPL list and welfare measures were raised.

The highway is the main channel through which fish and eggs bound for Calcutta and south Bengal arrive from Andhra. Fruit from north and west India and medicines from Maharashtra also take the same route.

About 10,000 trucks ply on the highway daily, carrying — apart from the food items coming in — potatoes and rice from Bengal to other states. Petrol and diesel from the Haldia refinery are ferried out and iron ore from Jharkhand brought in by the same road.

Around 2pm, some 200 men and women armed with axes, spears, bows and arrows chopped trees from jungles adjoining Lodhashuli and plonked them across the width of the highway.

By evening, around 400 vehicles — including several trucks and six luxury buses — were standing bumper-to-bumper on both sides of the blockade. Two private buses, carrying nearly 200 people from West Midnapore’s Sabang to Belpahari for a puja, were also stranded.

“We took NH 6 because most roads to Belpahari are blocked with trees. But we have been stuck at Lodhashuli from 2pm. We tried to turn back but the villagers also blocked the road behind us. We don’t know how we will spend the night without food and water,” said Shankar Mondal, a 40-year-old farmer, before the blockade was lifted.

“We reasoned with the protesters that passengers in stranded vehicles could be robbed at night and it was not safe for them. Then they agreed to lift the blockade,” said Rajesh Kumar Singh, SP of West Midnapore. ( )