Police said heavily-armed members of Laloo Yadav gang swooped on the village, some 40-km from here, and fired indiscriminately at VVF men, killing five instantly.

Of the ten, who received gun shot wounds, two succumbed to injuries in hospital, police said.

The gang had a couple of days ago killed two persons at the same village, police said.

Four days earlier, 12 people, including seven children, of a minority family were killed by unknown assailants in Lotwo village in Palamu district.Inspector General of Police (Tirhut range) A K Gupta, Deputy Inspector General of Police M K Kazmi and DM (West Champaran) Sudhir Kumar were camping at the scene of Saturday night's massacre to oversee combing operations launched to arrest the killers. BiharCongress president Sadanand Singh and another senior party leader, Vijay Shanker Mishra, condemned the incident and said the Rabri Devi Government had lost moral right to continue in the wake of increasing killings in the State.