Hospital rampage

Purulia, March 13: Residents ransacked a health centre in Manbazar and set ablaze a motorcycle and a truck carrying medicines and furniture last night assuming that the facility was being wound up.

Some beds, furniture and medicines were actually being taken to a primary health centre at nearby Basantapur, 350 km from Calcutta, to upgrade facilities there. About 1,000 residents of Bira village, whose 35-year-old, 10-bed hospital was shut today because of the violence, were part of the mob. “Three villagers have been held,” Purulia police chief R. Shivkumar said. Jiten Mahato, a villager, said: “If the centre were shifted, we would have had to travel 80 km to Purulia town for treatment.”

Girl rescued

Asansol: A trader’s daughter was rescued on Monday after passengers of a Barakar-bound bus saw her sitting with two men and weeping. Sanjay and Karu Paswan, who were arrested, had told Twinkle Verma, a Class III student, they would drop her home but took a different bus.

Slap stick

Santiniketan: Visva-Bharati has asked its physical education department to send a student home after he was accused of slapping a second-year girl of Sangeet Bhavan. A probe into the incident has also been ordered.