BHUBANESWAR: The opposition BJP and Congress on Saturday came down heavily on the state government for its failure to prevent violence in Sambalpur despite prior information of possible disturbance during the Hanuman Jayanti celebration.
Terming the attack on Hanuman Jayanti procession as pre-planned, BJP MLA Lalitendu Bidyadhar Mohapatra, who led a fact-finding team of the party to Sambalpur, told mediapersons here that it was definitely not a spur of the moment reaction of people of a particular community.
“Sambalpur town was under the control of police due to imposition of prohibitory orders. Under what circumstances a youth was murdered and why the police is clueless about it is baffling. What surprises us more is the silence of Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik even three days after the unfortunate incident and the murder of a young man,” he said.
He alleged, with no clarification from the district administration on the murder and conduct of the funeral of the deceased in a hush-hush manner on Friday night pointed to the fact that the government is trying to cover up something. “We urge the administration to make the postmortem report public and inform about the condition of the other person who was with the deceased. The government must announce compensation for the deceased's family,” the BJP lawmaker demanded.
The BJP team stated it had talked to a cross-section of the people and the district administration and came to know that the Hanuman Jayanti Coordination Committee had conveyed its apprehension of some untoward incident during the procession to the officials.
“Surprisingly, only 10-12 police personnel were deployed at a place considered to be ‘most sensitive’ in Sambalpur town during the bike rally undertaken by around 5,000 people. Circumstantial evidence shows a conspiracy was hatched to foment trouble. The attempt to protect a particular community has exposed the secular credentials of the government,” said party spokesperson Biranchi Tripathy.
Questioning repeated intelligence failure, Congress leader Bijay Patnaik said the attack on police personnel on duty has exposed the government and police administration in particular. Responding to Opposition’s allegations, senior BJD leader Debi Prasad Mishra said the matter should not be politicised and given communal colour. He said the situation is under control and action is being taken against miscreants and rumour mongers.