Curfew Relaxed But Internet Shutdown Continues; BJP Team To Visit Odisha’s Sambalpur Today

Sambalpur: Internet services will remain suspended for another 24 hours till 10 am on Wednesday in Odisha’s Sambalpur, which is slowly crawling back to normalcy having witnessed large-scale violence in the run-up and during Hanuman Jayanti procession.

This came amid the district administration’s decision to further relax the curfew hours from Tuesday onwards. The morning window will be from 7.30 am till 1 pm while in the afternoon it will remain unchanged from 3.30pm-6 pm.

Internet services have been shut down in Sambalpur since April 13, a day after communal violence broke out in the district headquarters town, to curb circulation of inflammatory messages and prevent misuse of social media.

Meanwhile, a high-level BJP delegation, including Union Minister Bisheswar Tudu, MPs Jual Oram and Suresh Pujari, MLAs Nauri Nayak, Shankar Oram and Kusum Tete, state BJP chief Manmohan Samal and his predecessor Sameer Mohanty is also scheduled to arrive here and meet those injured in the violence, members of Hanuman Jayanti Samanwaya Samiti as well as the Revenue Divisional Commissioner.

Police sources said the total number of arrests has touched 85 with six more persons being nabbed in connection with the arson and violence, which left at least 10 police personnel injured.