BHUBANESWAR (India), March 18: Indian Maoist rebels, suspected of killing 55 police in an attack last week, on Sunday called for a strike across four eastern Indian states to protest the police shooting 14 villagers.

“The people must come to terms with the fact that governments in these states are agents of imperialist forces, and should rise to fight their anti-people agenda,” the rebels said in a statement issued in the eastern state of Orissa.

The rebels called for a strike on Tuesday in Orissa, as well as in the eastern states of Bihar, Jharkhand and West Bengal.

In Nandigram village in West Bengal on Wednesday, police shot dead 14 protesters who were trying to prevent the compulsory purchase of land to build an industrial park.

On Thursday, Maoist rebels killed 55 police in an attack on a jungle security post in eastern Chhattisgarh state.

Maoist rebels are active in half of India's 29 states, particularly in many of the regions that have seen the worst violence over land acquisition for industry under India's plan to set up Special Economic Zones (SEZs).

A protest against the construction of a Tata steel complex in Orissa's remote Kalinga Nagar area led to the shooting deaths of 13 villagers last January.

Villagers in Nandigram say that activists in the state's ruling Communist Party, dressed as police, were involved in the shooting of the protesters.—AFP