PATNA: Amid the high-pitch campaign for the Bankipur Assembly by-election, police on Wednesday conducted searches at a hotel owned by Ravi Narayan Singh, a close associate of Jan Suraaj Party (JSP) founder Prashant Kishor.
Singh presently holds the post of state secretary of the Jan Suraaj Party. Kishor is pitted against BJP's Neeraj Kumar Sinha and RJD's Rekha Gupta in the bypoll being held on the seat vacated by sitting BJP MLA Nitin Nabin, who is now a Rajya Sabha member and the party's national president.
JSP state president Manoj Bharti, who met the Bihar Chief Electoral Officer on Wednesday, alleged that police were targeting party leaders and workers, conducting raids at hotels and the residences of party workers out of political vendetta.
Bharti said Ravi Narayan Singh's hotel was searched to intimidate party workers and leaders ahead of the by-election. He claimed that police demanded old guest registers and threatened to seal the property and send Singh to jail.
Singh also claimed that despite his assurance to retrieve the older data from a secondary administrative office within 10 days, officers threatened legal action, property sealing and imprisonment.
Meanwhile, a high-level delegation of the Jan Suraaj Party, led by state president Manoj Bharti, met the Bihar Chief Electoral Officer and submitted a memorandum alleging violations of the Model Code of Conduct and the harassment of party workers by the police.
He alleged that the administrative machinery was being misused in the Bankipur Assembly constituency to intimidate Jan Suraaj Party workers.
Bharti told the media that party workers were being harassed by the police in Patna and other parts of Bihar without any reason and without any FIR being registered against them.
"Police are visiting the homes of party workers, harassing them, and creating a false impression against them. Such actions by the administration are against the Model Code of Conduct," he claimed.
The JSP leader also alleged that businessmen in Bankipur were being intimidated with threats of Income Tax and GST raids by the administration.
The action against JSP leaders came a day after a delegation of BJP leaders met the Chief Electoral Officer and demanded a probe into the alleged use of money in the election by JSP candidate Prashant Kishor.
