Lucknow: The Samajwadi Party on Wednesday said it would raise in the Uttar Pradesh assembly the death of a woman and her daughter allegedly due to self-immolation during an anti-encroachment drive in Kanpur Dehat. The Opposition party will raise the incident in the assembly's Budget Session -- scheduled to start on Monday -- to get justice for the victims, its leaders said.
Police on Tuesday booked 39 people, including a sub-divisional magistrate, four revenue officials and over a dozen police personnel, on murder and other charges following the Monday incident. The Samajwadi Party's chief whip in the House, Manoj Pandey, and its MLA Amitabh Vajpayee, while speaking to reporters here, demanded Rs 5 crore compensation to the aggrieved family for each of the deaths and government jobs for two of its members.
Vajpayee, who represents Kanpur in the state assembly, demanded that FIR be registered against the district magistrate and the official be arrested for the incident. Pandey alleged that the administration stopped a Samajwadi Party (SP) delegation going to the incident site at the direction of party chief Akhilesh Yadav.
"In a democracy can't we participate in the tragedy of somebody and share the grief?" he asked and sought to know what the Kanpur Dehat administration was trying to hide by preventing the delegation from going there. Questioning registration of FIR against low-ranking officials and not the district magistrate and tehsildar, Pandey said that a lekhpal or some other subordinate officials cannot be held responsible for the incident.
"The JCB driver (engaged in the demolition drive) getting a monthly salary of Rs 1,500 cannot be the main actor in the incident," he claimed. JCB driver Deepak, Madauli lekhpal Ashok Singh, three unnamed lekhpals and an unnamed kanungo (revenue official) were also among those booked in the case.
If the Uttar Pradesh government is sincere in saying that it wishes to help the aggrieved family, it should give financial compensations and government jobs, Pandey said. On Uttar Pradesh Deputy Chief Minister Brajesh Pathak talking to the victims' family over phone, he said such an act or words of condolence in newspapers would not serve the purpose.
Instead of running a "bulldozer" on inflation, providing employment and saving farmers' crops from being ruined, innocent people are dying, the SP leader said. PTI
