Cuttack, Nov 11 (PTI) The Orissa High Court Thursday ruled that only a hartal can be held and not a general strike and that no political party is entitled to paralyse normal life in the entire state in the name of bandh.

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A division bench headed by Chief Justice S Muralidhar gave the ruling while hearing a PIL of a Cuttack-based businessman against the six-hour banch called by Congress on Friday from 6 AM demanding immediate sacking and arrest of the Odisha minister of state for home D S Mishra for his alleged closeness with the prime accused in the Kalahandi woman teacher kidnap and murder.

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The court ruled that rail and road traffic cannot be blocked and normal life cannot be disrupted by forcing business establishments to down their shutters during the hartal.

Following an assurance by the Congress that the protest would be peaceful, the court directed the director general of police to prosecute those who forcibly paralyse normal life, petitioner's counsel Soumya Ranjan Mohanty said.

(The above story is verified and authored by Press Trust of India (PTI) staff. PTI, India’s premier news agency, employs more than 400 journalists and 500 stringers to cover almost every district and small town in India.. The views appearing in the above post do not reflect the opinions of LatestLY)