LUCKNOW: A day after Congress leaders Rahul Gandhi and Priyanka Gandhi were stopped and allegedly manhandled by the Uttar Pradesh Police, Trinamool Congress MP Derek O’Brien along with some party leaders were on Friday restrained by the cops on their way to Hathras’s Boolgarhi village to meet the family of 20-year-old gang-rape and murder victim.
The district police did not let the TMC leaders enter the village on the pretext of Section 144 in force in the area.
The TMC delegation, led by Rajya Sabha MP Derek O’Brien, was stopped outside the victim’s village and a scuffle between the leaders and the cops ensued during which O’Brien was pushed and he fell on the ground.
MP from Barasat Kakoli Ghosh-Dastidar was also allegedly roughed up by the police.
The TMC also alleged that its leader Pratima Mondal was manhandled and pushed by a senior district official.
The TMC delegation was asked to stay behind the barricades, which were put up at the entry point of the village.
O’Brien had urged the Hathras Police to let Ghosh-Dastidar visit the aggrieved family members, but the police turned down his request.
“I am sick and tired of UP,” O’Brien said.
“It is an atrocity against Dalits and women by the government. Can’t I even meet and comfort the family members of the victim?” asked Ghosh-Dastidar.
He said: “We have filed a police complaint against the Hathras Sadar SDM with a request that it be turned into an FIR. We will also write to the Lok Sabha speaker on the matter.”
In her complaint, Mandal wrote, “When we tried to meet the family this morning, SDM (Prem Prakash) Meena pushed me and tried to forcibly stop me. We have come from West Bengal to offer our condolences to the family of the victim. In democracy to stop a public representative from meeting a victim’s family is the murder of democracy.”
CM Yogi Adityanath said his government was committed to women’s safety and those who even think of harming their self-respect will face total destruction.
“Total destruction of those who even think of harming the self-respect of women in UP is inevitable,” Adityanath said in a tweet in Hindi.
Such people will get exemplary punishment that would be remembered by future generations, he said. “They will get such a punishment that it will set an example,” he said, adding that “this is our resolve and promise.