Manas Dasgupta
NEW DELHI, Oct 5: A day after they were taken into preventive custody and kept in a guest house, the Congress general secretary Priyanka Gandhi Vadra and 10 others were officially placed under arrest to “prevent the commission of cognizable offences.”
The Congress leaders were held by the Uttar Pradesh police to prevent them from visiting the scene of Sunday mayhem, Lakhimpur-Kheri where eight people were killed, four protesting farmers allegedly mowed down by speeding cars and gunshots and four BJP workers in retaliation lynched to death by angry protesters. Priyanka and her party colleagues were stopped on their way to Lakhimpur-Kheri and kept in a local guest house. The Chhattisgarh chief minister Bhupesh Baghel claimed that he was not allowed to move out of the Lucknow airport due to his intention to visit Lakhimpur-Kheri.
The speeding car under which four farmers were killed was claimed to be driven by Ashish Mishra, the son of the union minister of state for home Ajay Mishra Teni. The police, however, is yet to arrest Ashish Mishra though an FIR has been filed against him naming him for reckless driving and murder. To a question, the UP police, however, defended the inaction claiming that they were too busy with the agitating farmers, the “accident” and the post-mortem of the bodies to arrest the accused.
Both Ajay Mishra and the accused son have denied that they were present on the spot. The union minister said he had “evidence” to prove that both he and his son far away from the scene of the accident while the accused claimed that he was was watching a “wrestling match” at her paternal uncle’s village Banwirpur at the time of the incident at Lakhimpur-Kheri.
After much of negotiations, the family members of the three of the farmers agreed to cremate the bodies but the body of the fourth killed farmer as yet to be cremated. The farmers have demanded that his bod bore gunshot wounds which had not been mentioned in the post-mortem report. They demanded a second post-mortem on the body in some hospital in Delhi and not in UP.
Other than Priyanka Gandhi, those arrested include Congress leader Deepender Singh Hooda, UP Congress state president Ajay Kumar Lallu and party MLC Deepak Singh. The arrest has been made under section 151 (arrest to prevent the commission of cognizable offences) of the CrPC.
“Total 11 persons have been arrested by us. On Monday around 4.30 am, Priyanka ji was stopped while on her way to Lakhimpur-Kheri. We told her that you should not go there as the situation is not fine and section 144 CrPC is in effect. She did not listen to us and in proper security presence, we had to take her to a local guest house,” said Hargaon station house officer (SHO) Brijesh Kumar Tripathi, adding that further course of action would be decided by senior officials.
Earlier in the day, Priyanka issued a video statement addressed to Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who is on a Lucknow visit, and asked if he had seen a video purportedly of the Lakhimpur incident. She then played the video, which shows what appears to be a Mahindra Thar coming from behind and running over a group of protestors walking on a road.
“This video shows the son of your minister mowing down farmers under his vehicle. Watch this video and tell the country why this minister hasn’t been suspended and why the boy hasn’t been arrested yet. You have kept opposition leaders like me in arrest without any order of FIR, and I want to know why why this person is free,” she asked.
“Today when you will be sitting at the stage of ‘Azadi ka Amrit Utsav’, please remember that the farmers gave us freedom. Even today our borders are secured by sons of farmers. The farmers are in despair for months and are raising their voice, but you are denying it. I request you to come to Lakhimpur and understand their pain. Providing them security is your dharma, and dharma of the constitution you took oath on,” she added.
The video that apparently captured the moment the SUV drove into the crowd of protesters and crushed many of them, is being circulated in social media. Besides many opposition leaders, it was also tweeted by BJP MP Varun Gandhi, who said it “shakes the soul.” Ads by
Earlier, Congress leader Deepender Singh Hooda put out a tweet, saying they are under arrest for the past 36 hours while those running over farmers are roaming free. “Those mowing down farmers are free and we are in police custody for 36 hours. There is mourning in farmer families but utsav (festival) is being celebrated in Lucknow. I want to ask the people if this country if they will support those who run over or fight for those ran over,” he tweeted.
Ajay Mishra claiming evidence to prove their absence at the scene of the incident said he and his son were ready to face any investigating agency. “Culprits, who have planned this incident won’t be spared,” he said. Speaking in his son’s defence, the MoS added, “We aren’t aware of how the incident happened. Based on information and videos, it’s visible that the driver was killed after being pulled out of the car. If it were my son, he’d have been dead. It’s impossible to get out of a place where a car ran over people amid a gathering of thousands.”
On Monday, the police registered an FIR on charges of murder against Ashish Mishra, who was allegedly driving one of the vehicles in the convoy that hit the farmers. The state government announced Rs 45 lakh each for the families of the deceased. Further, a judicial committee headed by a senior judge would probe the incident.
One of the injured farmers who was admitted in a hospital, Tejinder Virk, however, claimed that he had seen Ashish Mishra at the wheels of one of the three SUVs that hit the farmers from behind killing four of them before they abandoned the vehicles because of the rush of the crowd and escaped firing gun shots.
Stating that it was “unfortunate” that even 72 hours after the incident, Mishra had not been arrested, Virk, who had organised the protest on Sunday against the Union Minister’s visit to the area for an event, said “This was a conspiracy to kill us. Ajay Mishra had given a statement that he would not allow farmers in Uttar Pradesh, let alone Lakhimpur. We were protesting against this statement. We were constantly in touch with the police and administration. We were standing along the route to wave black flags at him,” he said.
“We were told at 3 pm that their route has changed. We started going back peacefully. Suddenly, speeding cars hit us from behind. The car was at over 100 km/hour speed. They ran us over on purpose. Ajay Mishra’s son and his men were in the car. Then I lost consciousness.”
According to Virk, an agitated crowd later attacked the convoy. “Our people saved some of them and turned them in to the cops. I am willing to testify. The Yogi Adityanath government is helping the attackers,” he said.
Simranjeet Singh, another farmer, said he saw people deserting the cars in the convoy, firing shots, and running away. But he said he couldn’t see who was driving the SUV that rammed protesters. It started out as a peaceful protest against the Union Minister’s visit, in which black flags would be shown to him. Within 3 minutes, the cars drove into the protesters and people fell.
“I was volunteering and looking after the langar. Then a Thar, Fortuner, and Scorpio (three cars in the convoy) came charging at a speed of 80-100 km/hour. The Thar crushed our farmers from the back,” said Singh. On the driver of the Thar, Singh said: “It all happened very fast. On both sides of the Thar, there were men standing. The cars were moving at a high speed, you can tell from videos.”
He said he saw five-seven people coming out of the cars and firing constantly. The protesters had already declared they would be marching on that road, he said and had told the minister’s people that they should divert their cars.
Farmers who were protesting against the visit of his father of the state’s Deputy Chief Minister Keshav Maurya on Sunday, said the minister’s son was at the wheels of an SUV that mowed down a group, killing four people and injuring several others. The violence it triggered led to four other deaths. A video of the horrifying moment circulating on social media showed an SUV driving into a group of protesters from behind, crushing many of them.
Ajay Mishra had acknowledged the accident but said the vehicle overturned, crushing the protesters who were throwing stones at the cavalcade. The farmers have also alleged that one of the four people have died of bullet wounds, which had not been recorded in the post-mortem which the government had claimed would be carried out “in a transparent manner.”
Ashish Mishra had claimed that he was “not in the car. I was at my paternal home in Banwirpur village where a wrestling match was being organised. I was there from the morning till the end of the event.” The opposition leaders have repeatedly questioned the police inaction against him.
A group of lawyers from UP have written to the chief justice of India NV Ramana for an inquiry into the Lakhimpur-Kheri incident by the Central Bureau of Investigation directly under the Supreme Court’s supervision. In a petition, the asked the CJI to direct the Home Ministry to ensure the filing of a First Information Report and punishment for ministers involved in Sunday’s incident.