LUCKNOW: A 23-year-old Dalit woman, who had been missing since Tuesday, was found dead in bypoll bound Karhal assembly constituency in Mainpuri district of Uttar Pradesh on Wednesday when polling was underway in the assembly constituency.
The body of the deceased was spotted stuffed in a gunny bag with the family of the victim alleging that she was killed for refusing to vote in favour of the Samajwadi Party candidate in the Karhal assembly bypoll. The deceased woman's father alleged that she was abducted around 12 pm on Tuesday and was later poisoned to death.
According to local sources, the police on Wednesday arrested two persons accused of abducting and killing the woman. The woman's father in a complaint accused a local Samajwadi Party leader Prashant Yadav of abducting his daughter and killing her.
In the FIR, the victim’s father alleged that his daughter, after getting abducted on Tuesday afternoon, was poisoned to death by Yadav with the help of one Dr Mohan Katheria.
The woman's body was found in a field near Kanjara village on Wednesday morning. According to Mainpuri Superintendent of Police (SP) Vinod Kumar, both the accused Dr Mohan Katheria and Prashant Yadav, named in FIR, were arrested while further investigation into the incident was in progress.
Meanwhile, the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party accused the main opposition party of killing the woman as she refused to vote for SP. “In Karhal, Samajwadi Party leader Prashant Yadav and his associates murdered a Dalit girl just because she had refused to vote for the 'cycle' (SP's election symbol). In Mainpuri, the Saifai family and Akhilesh Yadav's goons are again trying to create an atmosphere of terror,” the BJP posted a video of the grieving woman's father on microblogging site X.
Moreover, hours after the Dalit woman was allegedly found murdered, UP BJP chief Bhupendra Chaudhary accused the SP of orchestrating the crime. “The SP has activated its crime cell after getting convinced of losing the by-polls,” Chaudhary said while speaking to media persons at the state party office here on Wednesday afternoon.
However, countering the accusation, SP national spokesperson Rajendra Choudhary called it a conspiracy to defame the Samajwadi Party by the BJP which often used to engage in such activities. “This has nothing to do with the SP," said the SP spokesperson.
Notably, in Karhal, the family bastion of the Samajwadi Party's first family, Akhilesh Yadav’s nephew Tej Pratap Yadav, is contesting against BJP’s Anujesh Pratap Singh who also hails from the Kahilesh Yadav family. The BSP has fielded Avanish Kumar Shakya.
The seat has a total of seven candidates, including nominees of Aazad Samaj Party (Kanshi Ram), Sarvjan Sukhay Party, Sarva Samaj Janata Party and one Independent. The bypoll was necessitated after Akhilesh Yadav vacated the seat as the sitting MLA after getting elected to Lok Sabha from Kannauj parliamentary constituency earlier this year.