A 24-hour strike in protest against fuel price hikes caused transport chaos and violent clashes in India's biggest cities yesterday.
The country's main opposition party, Bharatiya Janata (BJP), joined forces with other left-wing parties to call for a strike after the government refused to repeal a 6.7% increase on the price of fuel announced ten days ago.
Large companies and schools shut their doors and taxi and lorry drivers went home after the initial chaos caused massive traffic jams across the country. Calcutta and Chennai airports were also paralysed, and intercity trains were disrupted throughout the day.
The government imposed the increase in order to reign in a growing fiscal deficit. But the move has already pushed inflation up from 10% to 11%.
Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee has firmly ruled out rolling back the hike.
Demo in New Delhi. Video by our Observer, Richard Bennamias.
