Title - Maoist rebels destroy rail tracks in central India

JAGDALPUR  -- Suspected Maoist rebels Wednesday destroyed railway tracks in the central Indian forests as part of a protest week called against paramilitary operation that have been mounted to squash the insurgency.The rebels also blocked roads at many locations forcing all private and public vehicles off the roads, police said in the eastern state of Chhattisgarh.The disruption of rail and road traffic came a day after the rebels shot dead a militiaman from a counterrevolutionary group backed by the government. Manjhi Hemla Seeka, a former village councillor, was slain at a weekly market in a neighboring district.Railway officials said they had repaired the damaged tracks within hours and train services there would be resumed soon. The railways had curtailed train services through the region after the rebels announced this week's protests.The Communist Party of India (Marxist-Leninist), to which the rebels belong, has announced it would block efforts by the Indian Army to recruit soldiers from among the tribal people of the region.The Maoist rebels, most of them indigenous tribal folks, have waged a four-decade armed resistance to a bid by the government to acquire their lands for industrialization. The Indian government has now decided to push soldiers into the region.A Rebel pamphlet circulated this week identified business houses with mining and industrial interests in Chhattisgarh, where the insurgency is the strongest, as the biggest enemies of the tribal people.The rebels have also demanded the government release their cadres arrested earlier and now in prisons while being tried for seeking to overthrow the Indian state.An annual feature called in the memory of slain rebels, the protest week also sees cultural and political programs across villages in the forested region.