Leader of Opposition in Rajya Sabha Mallikarjun Kharge sought a probe by a sitting Supreme Court judge into the alleged illegal detention of Congress general secretary Priyanka Vadra by the Uttar Pradesh Government and death of farmers in Lakhimpur Kheri in Uttar Pradesh.
He said Ms. Vadra has been detained without an arrest warrant and kept in a rest house without declaring it as a sub-jail. “What’s the crime? Why has she been detained illegally?”
Former Supreme Court judge Madan Lokur had also slammed the U.P. police and termed the detention of Ms. Vadra as ‘unconstitutional’, Mr. Kharge said at a media conference in Bengaluru.
The Congress leader demanded immediate dismissal of Union Minister of State for Home Affairs Ajay Misra and immediate arrest of his son Ashish Misra. The Minister’s son ploughed his SUV through agitating farmers and killed some of them, Mr. Kharge alleged.
Noting that Mr. Ajay Misra, along with Chief Ministers of Haryana and U.P., has been instigating people to crack down on farmers who are protesting against the three ‘black’ laws passed by the Narendra Modi government, Mr. Kharge said U.P. Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath is unfit to hold the constitutional post.
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According to senior Supreme Court advocate Dushyant Dave, Mr. Kharge said, police should register sedition cases (124A) against Haryana and U.P. Chief Ministers, Union Minister Ajay Misra and his son for provoking people against farmers. But under the BJP government at the Centre and in States, police were registering sedition cases only against journalists and opposition leaders, the Congress leader claimed.
He questioned the silence of Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Home Minister Amit Shah on the killing of farmers and illegal detention of Ms. Vadra. He accused the BJP government at the Centre and in States of hatching a conspiracy against the Congress and its leaders, and preventing them from meeting family members of the people who were killed in Lakhimpur Kheri.
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“Why has the son of the Minister of State for Home Affairs not been arrested? Why was Ms. Vadra detained illegally? Why are Modi-Shah silent?” Mr. Kharge demanded immediate release of Ms. Vadra who has been detention for more than 40 hours without an arrest warrant.
