Indore protests: CM visits hurt BJP worker, Cong says assault planned

Indore/Bhopal: A day after the violent clashes between BJP and Congress workers at Gandhi Bhawan, chief minister Mohan Yadav reached Indore on Sunday and visited the hospital to meet Bindu Chauhan, the BJP worker who sustained head and facial injuries during Saturday's stone-pelting. Meanwhile the Indore district Congress put out a series of videos claiming that the footage clearly showed that the BJYM workers had pre-planned the assault and stone-pelting at the district Congress office.In one of the video's the district Congress president and LoP in IMC Chintu Choukse posted and tagged state Congress chief Jitu Patwari the caption read, "it is not Kashmir. It is BJYM workers planning and peacefully pelting stones on Congress workers." The veracity of the videos could not be ascertained and the police said they were looking into it.Chief minister Yadav accompanied by minister Tulsi Silawat, city party president Sumit Mishra, and several MLAs, the CM spoke with Chauhan about the incident and consulted with the medical team. "The state govt stands firmly with the victim's family. I directed the doctors to ensure the best possible medical care was provided," Yadav stated. During the interaction, Chauhan reportedly recounted the sequence of events that led to her injury.Simultaneously, the Congress party launched a digital offensive to challenge the BJP's narrative of a "peaceful protest". Indore City Chief and Leader of Opposition in the IMC Chintu Choukse released a series of photos and videos purportedly showing BJP workers preparing for the attack."The conspirators and stone-pelters are seen sitting with an MLA," Choukse claimed in a social media post. "Slowly, everything will come to light—how the BJP planned this entire operation, filling bags with stones and distributing tasks on who would throw what."Furthermore, a video shared on a platform associated with MP Congress President Jitu Patwari drew a sharp comparison to conflict zones. "Don't be surprised! This video is not from Kashmir, but from Indore... where BJP workers are 'peacefully' protesting by pelting stones. This is the real, ugly face of the party that talks about character and conduct," the post read.The dual narrative of victimhood and conspiracy ensured that the city remained on edge. While the BJP leaders claimed the incident was an unprovoked attack on their female activists, the Congress party positioned itself as the victim of an organised mob.Police authorities continued to monitor the situation closely, with deployment persisting near political offices. Verification of the newly released footage was underway to determine if further names would be added to the existing FIRs.Meanwhile in Bhopal, a video posted by local Congress MLA Arif Masood on X, in which he is seen talking to a Bhartiya Janta Yuva Morcha (BJYM) worker and later taking him on his scooter at some distance where the BJYM workers were about to assemble for demonstration at Pradesh Congress Committee (PCC) headquarters on Saturday, is going viral with his supporters sharing the video as a 'game changing moment'. In the same video, Masood is later seen talking to some media persons in which he tells them that the BJYM worker had 'mistakenly' come to the PCC rather than staying at the place where the BJYM workers are supposed to assemble for demonstration, therefore he took the BJYM worker on his scooter and left him there. Talking to TOI, Arif Masood said 'When I came to know that BJYM workers were coming to the PCC office, I hastily reached the PCC on my scooter. As I was talking to other party workers, I saw a youth wearing a saffron scarf of the BJP standing there alone and some angry Congress worker about to corner him. I talked to him and took him near the barricades at some distance, which I thought was necessary to avert any untoward incident.'