With heart of city choked for several hours bringing the entire traffic movement to halt and lathi charge on senior leaders to foil their bid from entering chief minister secretariat had brought new lease of life in Congress which almost reached to Intensive Care Unit (ICU) in the State. Administration had to arrest over five hundred workers including All India Congress Committee (AICC) general secretary, Madhusudan Mistri, state president Nirmal Khatri, former UPCC chief Rita Bahuguna Joshi, MP Anu Tandon, MP Kamal Kumar aka Commando, Pl Puniya etc when they along with a huge crowd took road and staged a massive demonstration to pressurise the state government to immediately implement Food Security Act. Dozens of Congressmen along with senior leaders were also injured in lathi charge.
Interestingly all the said leaders including union minister for coal Shree Prakash Jaiswal, chairman of SC Commission and MP from Barabanki Pl Puniya, several MPs and MlAs, who took roof-top on a SUV adjacent to Vidhan Bhawan when common workers were caned by the police, too comes under police attack when a cop suddenly opened lathi charge on them forcing all the senior leaders to sit on road in protest of police action.
In an unexpected gathering which turned after long time during any agitation of Congressmen, attacked ruling Samajwadi Party government for not forwarding the benefit of Food Security Act to poor and needy.
Addressing the gathering before taking out procession from lakshman Mela Ground here on Thursday morning almost all senior leaders which also included Mistri, Khatri, Jaiswal, Puniya, Rita Bahuguna, Anu Tandon etc, criticized Akhilesh Yadav for making politics over implementing Food Security Act. In one voice the Congress leaders claimed that SP fears that Congress would gain out of the above Act hence state government is making unnecessary delay in it’s implementation and making baseless arguments. The leaders claimed that they will not sit quite until the Act will be implemented in UP.
Soon after attacking SP leaders, Congress marched towards Vidhan Bhawan making the entire traffic movement to stand still all along Hazratganj, Vidhan Sabha Marg, and all roads adjacent to Vidhan Bhawan and Secretariat Annexe. As soon as thousand of Congress leaders reached and tried to scale through the wall to enter Vidhan Bhawan, the cops opened mild lathi charge on them in which about half a dozen worker which included Pramod Singh were injured. later Khatri, Mistri, Jaiswal, Punia, Anu Tandon suddenly changed the strategy and proceeded towards CM’s Annexe to ghearo it. The cops immediately rushed and tried to block their way infront of Prathiba Theatre. The police party had to resort to mild lathi charge on over half a dozen times and after over a hour of struggle between protesters and administration, cops opened brutal lathi charge in order to disperse the demonstrators.
They not even spared senior leaders who took roof top of a SUV to avoid confrontation. In front of Vidhan Bhawan also, cops brutally caned the Congress workers. later in protest of lathi charge, Mistri, Khatri and other senior leaders sat in protest against the police action terming it "an attack on their right to protest." They demanded that they should be either arrested or allowed to ghearo CM’s office at Annexe.
After half a hour of confrontation, Congress leaders again broke the police cordon and proceeded towards Annexe forcing the officers to somehow took Mistri, Khatri, Anu Tandon and Rita Bhauguna in custody. later Jagdambika Pal, Pl Puniya, ClP leader Pradeep Mathur were also arrested and taken to Reserve Police lines along with over 500 Congress workers who too were held during demonstration. Over two dozen of Congress workers who received serious injuries have been shifted to hospital.