Locals of over half a dozen villages of Mahottari district have left their homes and crossed over to India citing security risk from the District Administrative Office (DAO). Devendra Yadav, vice general secretary of Sadbhawana Party informed that 800 families of the district have taken refuge in Vittamod while 300 families have taken shelter in Madhapur, Bihar. Most of them are sheltering at their relatives' places in Bihar. The remaining others have set up camps at Vittamod and Madhapur, according to Yadav. Three cadres of the protesting Madhesi Morcha were killed in a clash with police at Mahendra Chowk in Jaleshwar last week. Two days after the incident, agitators attacked and killed an Assistant Sub Inspector (ASI) of Armed Police Force (APF). Two protesters were killed on the same day. Police and locals have been becoming violent toward each-other ever since. "We are too terrified to stay in our villages," said an elderly Kedarnath Pathak, 70, who is also the founder of Mahottari branch of the Nepal Red Cross Society. Locals have accused security personnel of behaving violently with them and claim that they have no other choice but to leave their villages. Locals claimed that police from Jaleshwar came to villages including Bajrahi, Ratawara, Sadi and Mahottari, Sonma among others after the murder of ASI Thaman Bahadur Bishwakarma and tormented them. Around 400 out of 500 households in Bajrahi village signed a joint statement and released and published it during the press release on Sunday. In the statement, they have said that they were forced to abandon their villages and take refuge in the neighboring country due to security threat."