Keeping the Bhatta-Parsaul pot boiling, United Progressive Alliance chairperson and Congress president Sonia Gandhi on Thursday criticised the Bahujan Samaj Party government of Mayawati for the alleged atrocities committed on farmers at Gautam Buddha Nagar (Noida) district.
Ms. Gandhi was speaking at a public meeting at Beniya Bagh here.
Describing the incidents of violence as “shameful,” she alleged that farmers' land was being bought with the help of the official machinery. “Politics of loot to benefit a few is being played in the State.” There was no rule of law in Uttar Pradesh, where anarchy prevailed. “Injustice and corruption are rampant.”
She said a land acquisition and rehabilitation Bill (to amend the Land Acquisition Act) would soon be introduced in parliament.
Unlike the NDA regime, the UPA government had acted to check corruption, Ms. Gandhi said. This manifested in the outcome of the Assembly elections in four States and the Union Territory of Puducherry. “The Congress has been the biggest beneficiary, while the Bharatiya Janata Party and the Left fared poorly.”
Ms. Gandhi criticised the Mayawati government for alleged mis-utilisation of funds meant for the the Central government schemes. The UPA government had approved a Rs.3,000-crore special package for the weavers of Purvachal, and a Rs.7,000-crore package for Bundelkhand. It would do something soon for Purvanchal.
“The people of the State are aware that all development works were accomplished under the Congress regimes; in the past 20 years, under the non-Congress governments, development had come to a standstill,” Ms. Gandhi said.
In an indirect reference to the BSP, she hit out at parties that blamed the UPA government for corruption. It was strange that they had turned a blind eye to corruption in Uttar Pradesh. “People living in glass houses should not throw stones at others,” he said.
The meeting was marked by a sizeable presence of Muslims, many of whom had come from the neighbouring districts of Mau and Ghazipur.
Ms. Gandhi's address to the closing session of the 83rd convention of the Uttar Pradesh Congress was cancelled following rain and thunderstorm in Varanasi on Wednesday night. The venue was changed after the ‘pandal' collapsed. The political and economic resolutions were passed on Thursday.
Rahul's charge refuted
PTI reports from Lucknow:
The Uttar Pradesh government on Thursday dismissed as baseless Congress general secretary Rahul Gandhi's allegations about burning of people and rape of women at Bhatta-Parsaul, rocked by farmers' agitation on land acquisition issue, and said preliminary forensic reports of the ashes collected from the area had ruled out the presence of human remains.
Addressing a press conference on behalf of Chief Minister Mayawati, Cabinet Secretary Shashank Shekar Singh said: “Preliminary forensic reports have not found any human bone or remains .There are traces of melted synthetic in the ash.”
Terming the charge on 74 people being killed there and women raped “baseless and an effort to malign the State government,” he suggested restraint over airing views which later required clarifications.
Mr. Shekar Singh said it was “most unfortunate that fake rape charges were made and they amount to playing with the honour of women. There had been no complaint of rape from the women of Bhatta-Parsaul.” “A detailed report on traces would be received in three to four days,” he said.
