(EDs: Rpting after minor edit in para 2)Lucknow, Oct 29 (PTI) A five-year-old boy died afterbeing hit allegedly by a car in the motorcade of Uttar Pradeshminister Om Prakash Rajbhar near Colonelganj in Gondadistrict, following which Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath hassought a report from the state police chief.
Rajbhar maintained he was not travelling with thecavalcade at the time of the incident even as oppositionparties attacked the state government over the incident whichcomes ahead of civic polls in UP.
One of the cars in Cabinet minister Rajbhar's cavalcade,while passing through the Colonelganj area yesterday, hadallegedly knocked down Shiva Goswami, who died on way tohospital last night, the police said.
Eyewitnesses and family members of the boy alleged thatno one in the convoy stopped to help the child. His fatherVishwanath alleged that the minister sped away in one of thecars that was decorated with garlands.
Rajbhar, however, claimed that he was 25 km away, inanother car, when the incident occurred.
The boy was playing by the side of a road when he was hitreportedly by one of the cars in the cavalcade. His mother andgrandmother were near the spot.
Following the incident, angry villagers placed the boy'sbody on the road demanding action. Visuals of the boy's fathercarrying the body were flashed repeatedly by TV channels.
Stepping in, Adityanath directed the state police chiefto submit a report and announced Rs 5 lakh compensation to thenext of kin of the deceased. He also directed the state DGP toinitiate strict action against those responsible for theincident.
Meanwhile, opposition parties targeted the Adityanathgovernment and Rajbhar over the incident.
SP leader Juhi Singh raised questions as to why nobodyhad the decency to stop and take care of the injured boy. "Wedemand his (Rajbhar's) resignation. Otherwise, the chiefminister should take action," she said.
Senior BSP leader Sudhindra Bhadoria termed the incidentas shameful. "It reminds us of the days of landlords andfeudal leaders who cared two hoots for the poor," he said.
Rajbhar, who heads the Suheldev Bharatiya Samaj Party, anally of the ruling BJP in Uttar Pradesh, is the statedivyangjan empowerment minister.
He was in the news three weeks back when a video wentviral on social media purportedly showing him warning thatparents who fail to send their children to school would belocked up in police stations without food and water.
In July, Rajbhar had threatened to sit on a dharna if asenior official in his home district was not removed.
Recently, another UP minister, Jai Kumar Singh Jaiki, wasin the news when a farmer in Jalaun district claimed that hiscrop was allegedly trampled by the convoy of the minister.
The farmer had alleged that last week nearly a dozenvehicles of the minister destroyed his crops in Orai.
Jaiki, an MLA of BJP ally Apna Dal (Sonelal) fromJahanabad assembly constituency in Fatehpur district, however,said there were no standing crop on the field, as the sownmustard seeds were yet to germinate, but still Rs 4,000 waspaid to the farmer as damages. PTI SMI NSD ADSADSADS.
This is unedited, unformatted feed from the Press Trust of India wire.