Congress attacks Yogi government on Priyanka detention

Mirzapur/New Delhi: Training its guns on Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath following detention of its general secretary in-charge of Eastern Uttar Pradesh Priyanka Gandhi, the Congress on Friday said Uttar Pradesh has become 'Aparadh' (crime) Pradesh under the BJP rule.

"The Yogi government is now infamous for all crimes that happen in Uttar Pradesh, be it murder, atrocities against women or robbery", said AICC communication in-charge Randeep Singh Surjewala.

Addressing mediapersons at party headquarters, Surjewala said that Priyanka, who is being held at Chunar guest house, has stated that she peacefully wants to go and meet with the victims' family in Sonebhadra village, where 10 people were killed in caste violence between Gonds and Gujjars on Wednesday.

Congress sources said the authorities in Mirzapur were trying to persuade Gandhi to sign a bond and return to Delhi, but she had refused, firm on going to the site where the killings took place.

Gandhi was detained at the Chunar Guest House here after she was stopped from going to Murtiya village in Sonebhadra district.

The police denied that she had been arrested. She arrived in Varanasi on Friday morning and met the injured persons admitted to the Trauma Centre at the Banaras Hindu University.

When she proceeded towards Sonebhadra, her convoy was stopped on the Mirzapur border.

A defiant Gandhi then squatted on the ground with Congress workers and was later taken away in a government vehicle to Chunar. She told reporters: "I don't know where are they taking me. We are ready to go anywhere."

Gandhi asked the officials for written orders on why she was being prevented from going to Sonebhadra. "I just want to meet the families of the victims.

I am willing to take only four people with me because I do not want to defy the prohibitory orders and yet the district administration is not allowing us," she complained.

Former Congress president and Priyanka's brother Rahul Gandhi described her detention was "disturbing".

"This arbitrary application of power, to prevent her from meeting families of the 10 Adivasi farmers brutally gunned down for refusing to vacate their own land, reveals the BJP government's increasing insecurity in UP," he tweeted.

Police have arrested 24 people in connection with the caste violence. A case has been filed against 78 people.