Life was paralysed across the Nepalese capital on Monday as the Maoists enforced a shutdown on the city, protesting the mysterious death of one their cadres and demanding a probe into the episode. Transport services were halted, schools and colleges shut down and markets closed as the Maoists organised protest rallies in different parts of the city demanding probe into the "killing" and action against the guilty.

Rajendra Phuyal, a district committee member of the Maoist-affiliated Young Communist League (YCL), was found in critical condition in Dharmasthali area of Kathmandu district on June 11 and was declared dead at a hospital. The Maoists, who suspect that Phuyal was killed, are demanding a probe into the incident.

The situation was tense in Balaju and Maharajgunj areas on Sunday as Maoist cadres, who burnt tyres and blocked roads, clashed with the police. On Monday as well, they blocked roads at several places to enforce a strike and stoned half a dozen vehicles defying the shutdown, police said. A 12-year-old boy from Kalaiya district of southern Nepal, who was brought here after he fell seriously ill, was escorted to the hospital by the Armed Police Force personnel as the roads were blocked due to the strike.

Meanwhile, the two youths who helped rescue a kidnapped schoolgirl on the outskirts of the capital, said they fear for their own security after it was revealed that the mastermind of the kidnapping was a cadre with the Maoists' youth wing. Principle of the girl's school met Prime Minister Madhav Kumar Nepal, and demanded security for the rescuers.