Congress MlA from Vrindawan in Mathura Pradeep Mathur, who is also Congress legislative Party (ClP) leader in the State Assembly had accused Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav for not giving him time to listen to Mathura’s problem which finally turned violent and claimed 29 lives including that of two police officers.
``For the last four months, I was regularly trying to meet Akhilesh Yadav and appraised him of the violent situation in Mathura but the chief minister gave me no time to listen to it”, claimed Mathur while attacking the government for it’s failure to tackle the situation in Mathura. Interestingly he also charged that all the senior officers were well aware of the problem but their inaction had resulted into large number of causalities.
``After failing to meet chief minister, I handed over several representation regarding Mathura’s problem to all senior officers which included chief secretary Alok Ranjan, principal secretary (Home) Dewasheesh Panda, director general of police Javeed Ahmed, principal secretary to chief minister Anita Singh etc but I am sorry to say that either they took the matter very lightly or they were forced to do so due to influence of some high profile person”, alleged Mathur.
Demanding a judicial probe into the matter by a retired judge, Mathur even went on to say that the local administration in Mathura had never cared of any problem incident that caused due to illegal encroachment in Jawahar Bagh. ``The local officers were just engaged in extortion and corruption and never listen to public woes just as they were politically well connected in this government”, charged Mathur while questioning that why it took five days to the chief minister just to shift DM and SSP when both along with all other local officials deserve more stern action and not transfer which is an routine exercise.
Meanwhile Mathur also claimed sure victory of both the Party candidates – Kapil Sibbal and Deepak Singh, for Rajya Sabha and Vidhan Parishad’s seats respectively. ``Bharatiya Janta Party was now exposed of facilitating horse trading after supporting candidature of Preeti Mahapatra”, charged Mathur while claiming that none of the Congress MlAs would change loyalities. ``All the 29 Party MlAs will attend the Congress legislative Party meeting called by me on Wednesdaymorning”, Mathura said to support his claim that none of the Party leaders will vote for any other candidate.
When asked that a senior MlA of his own Party had recently criticised Kapil Sibbal openly after his candidature was announced, Mathur claimed that matter was already resolved. ``Yes I know of whom you are asking for making a comment on Sibbal but I wanted to tell you that Sibbal had now talked thrice to that MlA and he was `Happy’ to support our Rajya Sabha nominee”, Mathur replied.
Interestingly Mathur even used `Bechara’ term for the candidates while replying that if all his Party MlAs would support Party’s nominees and were not indulged in cross-voting. ``A candidate is always `bechara’ and was bound to make a MlA `happy’ in case anyone registers his reservation towards supporting him”, Mathur said in a guarded language while pointing that if the Party MlAs had any grievance than they will attend him within the Party but the Party’s flock will remain united to ensure victory of both the candidates”, he asserted. ClP leader also claimed that talks were on with other main parties and they would get support of all secular parties as well as independent candidates.