The lull in Chhattisgarh politics after weeks of high-voltage campaigning for the Assembly election has been broken with the ruling Congress and the BJP taking potshots at each other over a recent Supreme Court judgment.
The court on November 21 had dismissed a plea of the National Investigation Agency (NIA) against the Chhattisgarh police’s probe into an FIR alleging larger conspiracy in the 2013 Jheeram valley attack.
Twenty-nine people were killed on May 25, 2013 when Naxals attacked a convoy of Congress leaders at Jheeram valley in Darbha area of Bastar district. The dead included then State Congress chief Nand Kumar Patel, former Leader of the Opposition Mahendra Karma, and former Union Minister Vidya Charan Shukla. The attack took place when political campaigning for the then Assembly election was on and the party leaders were returning after a ‘Parivartan rally’ in Bastar district.
