A day after the massacre of 18 people in Giridih district, the Maoists struck again and gunned down four villagers in Jharkhand’s Latehar district in the wee hours of Sunday.

Confirming the incident, Latehar Superintendent of Police (SP) Ravikant Dhan said a combing operation has been launched in the area to nab the extremists. The police recovered bodies from the forest areas near Boda village of the district in the morning.

The police have also recovered the pamphlets from the spot saying that death was executed as they (victims) were working as police informers. The victims have been identified as the residents of Boda village of Latehar district.

A wave of fear continues to prevail among the villagers in and around Chilkari village in Giridih district where 18 people including a son of former Jharkhand chief minister Babulal Marandi were killed by the Maoist guerrillas in a Friday midnight attack. “No arrests have been made so far in this connection, though the combing operation is on,” said a police official.

Rail and road services were badly affected in different parts of the state as Marandi’s Jharkhand Vikash Morcha (JVM) observed a bundh in protest against the killing of 18 people. However, no untoward incident was reported from any part of the state.