Jubilation ruled the Steel City as Congress activists celebrated the victory of Congress candidate Sukhdeo Bhagat who emerged winner defeating BJP supported All Jharkhand Students Union’s (AJSU) candidate Niru Bhagat in Jharkhand’s lohardaga Assembly by-election.
The activists distributed sweets and smeared vermilion on each others’ faces and broke into dancing to the beat of drums after a clear trend emerged that the Congress was headed for a victory.
The office of Congress Party in Bistupur was gripped with celebrations as party activists hit streets and distributed sweets to people. They shouted ‘Congress zindabad'.
Senior Congress leader and secretary of Jharkhand State Congress Party SRA Rizwi Chabban said that the victory of Congress party only goes to show that the people of Jharkhand are not at all happy with the performance of BJP led Government in State.
“Despite promises made by the Chief Minister after winning Assembly elections the State Government failed to pay the heed to the development issues. The people of lohardaga have voted against the State rule and now we want to celebrate every moment of it,” said an upbeat Chabban.
Meanwhile, Vijay Khan, district Congress president, said that the overwhelming victory of Congress in the by elections will boost the morale of party workers in Jharkhand and will play an important role to unite the party workers.
He said that the party workers must draw lessons and must unite. The leader accused BJP of promoting corruption in the State and said that the voters have taught NDA a lesson. “It is important to work with utmost commitment to live up to the expectation of the people of Jharkhand. It is time party people must wake up,” he noted lamenting over current state of affairs.
Another leader of Congress said that the idea must be to associate with the workers and spread party’s vision in the State. He noted that it is a final call and infighting has to end to achieve the goal. “It is important to work with utmost commitment to live up to the expectation of the people of Jharkhand. It is time party people must wake up,” he noted.
The lohardaga assembly seat fell vacant after AJSU legislator Kamla Kishore Bhagat was convicted and handed over a seven-year jail term in July in an extortion case.SP Heeralal Ravi. Apart from recovering the amount the police have nabbed the mastermind and three others in this case. Police also recovered the bike used in this bank robbery.
According to Ravi the kingpin of the bank loot was Shyam Raj Sharma who is now in police net. Police recovered one 7.62 bore pistol and five cartridges from Sharma. Sharma was remanded in judicial custody on Thursday. The DSP told The Pioneer that Sharma has a string of bank dacoities to his name; FIRs against him for bank dacoity in 2008, 2010 and 2015. He has also Arms Act case filed against him.
Ravi also said that Sharma’s arrest led to the arrest of two more of his accomplices identified as Rahul Kumar Sharma and Saurav Ram. The trio were arrested on Wednesday in Bansdeeh area under Chainpur police station. Police recovered Rs1 lakh from Sharma and his two accomplices. Asked as to how police can vouch that this Rs1 lakh is of the looted cash of SBI DSP Ravi said that there was a bank note slip on the wad which reads SBI Ketat and so there is no iota of doubt left now in this regard.
Ravi also said that Rs50,000 was recovered earlier in this case wherein a bank robber had got a Term Deposit Receipt (TDR) in his wife’s name in a Vananchal Gramin Bank in Polpol. Police got the TDR terminated in order to get back the amount. DSP said with the arrest of Sharma the bank robbery case stands fully cracked.