New Delhi, Apr 7 (IANS): Demanding immediate steps to curb price rise and raising various other issues, the four Left parties will organise mass picketing and courting arrest programmes across the country Thursday.

Twenty-five lakh people will participate in mass picketing to be held in all district headquarters and in courting arrest programmes which will be held outside central government offices across the country, Left party leaders said.

The decision to hold an agitation April 8 was announced at a rally organised last month in the national capital against price rice, for land rights, employment and against the violence on the Left in West Bengal.

However, the leaders said there will not be court arrest programmes in West Bengal and Kerala, the states ruled by the Left. Instead, mass picketing programmes will be held in Kerala and West Bengal, they said.

The Left parties also demanded that the public distribution system be strengthened as well as the implementation of land reforms and employment opportunities.