Forward Bloc workers give sweets and water to children stranded in New Cooch Behar. Picture by Himangshu Ranjan Deb

Siliguri, Jan. 3: It was a double whammy for people of north Bengal.

Hundreds of passengers were stranded as trains crawled to a halt across the region in response to the Forward Bloc’s 12-hour rail roko and the National Democratic Alliance-sponsored Bihar bandh.

Trains services in the Alipurduar and Katihar divisions of Northeast Frontier Railway were disrupted when scores of Forward Bloc supporters squatted on the railway tracks in different stations, including New Alipurduar, New Jalpaiguri and New Cooch Behar. The party had called the “rail roko” to protest the bifurcation of the Alipurduar division and to demand a railway recruitment centre in north Bengal.

Trains on the crucial Sealdah-New Jalpaiguri route were halted for several hours at Kishanganj station because of the Bihar bandh. Hundreds of tourists bound for Darjeeling to witness the snowfall in Tiger Hills were stranded when the bandh supporters stopped Darjeeling Mail at Kishanganj. The waiting taxi drivers fleeced the stranded tourists desperate to reach Siliguri.

”They asked for Rs 1,500 for the three-hour ride to Siliguri. We complained to the policemen at the station, but they paid no heed. We finally had to pay the amount since we need to get to Darjeeling before dark,” said A.K. Das, a passenger.

Several computer merchants, coming to Siliguri from Calcutta to attend an information technology fair, complained that they, too, were ripped off by the cabbies.

State agriculture minister Kamal Guha, a senior Forward Bloc leader, led a group of party supporters onto the tracks at New Cooch Behar station. “The plan to bifurcate the New Alipurduar division is a ploy on the part of the Centre. We will fight to the end to resist it.”

No political party opposed the rail roko in north Bengal. “We fully support the Forward Bloc in its protest against the bifurcation of the Alipurduar subdivision,” Trinamul Congress’ Cooch Behar district convener Rabindranath Ghosh said.

Northeast Frontier Railway general manager Vipan Nanda said five major trains from Guwahati, including Rajdhani Express, were rescheduled because of the agitation by the Forward Bloc supporters. “We have tried our best to reduce the extent of the inconvenience caused to the passengers,” he said by phone from Guwahati. The Delhi-bound Rajdhani Express and Howrah-bound Kamrup Express were detained at the New Bongaigaon station.