Gandhis, Azad, others meet President, seek Teni’s dismissal

NEW DELHI: Escalating the pressure on the Lakhimpur Kheri violence case, a Congress delegation on Wednesday petitioned President Ram Nath Kovind and urged him to sack junior home minister Ajay

Mishra

Teni in the “interest of justice” for the farmers who were killed in the incident.


A team, led by Rahul Gandhi and comprising Mallikarjun Kharge, Ghulam Nabi Azad, AK Antony and Priyanka Gandhi Vadra, told Kovind that a fair probe was not possible until Mishra stayed in the ministry, calling him the “original source of provocation” which culminated in his son allegedly mowing down farmers with his SUV and who is now in custody. The opposition party said Mishra’s own role in the crime is still to be investigated.

The Congress leaders also submitted a memorandum to the President, listing out the details of the incident and alleging foul play by the Uttar Pradesh police and BJP government in the state. It mentioned that action was initiated in the case only after Rahul and Priyanka Gandhi took up the matter and visited the victims’ families. Besides seeking the scalp of Mishra, Congress also urged the President that a judicial inquiry by two sitting Supreme Court or high court judges be ordered into the incident that has “scarred the soul of India”.

Having made the Kheri violence a campaign and claiming that its pressure led to the case being registered against the minister’s son, Congress has held several protests nationally in the short span. The move to petition the President is seen as another attempt to keep the focus trained on the ministry and BJP.

Priyanka Gandhi told reporters that the President assured them that he would take up the matter with the government “today itself”.

Congress said the reaction of BJP and the government to the “deliberate murder in broad daylight” had eroded the faith of the people in the system. The memorandum said it was minister Mishra who first threatened the farmers, which is caught on video, and then a few days later, a convoy of cars mowed down farmers in Lakhimpur Kheri. It said eyewitnesses had seen the minister’s son in the car. It added police would not dare to fairly investigate the minister’s son when the father is occupying a position of “high influence”.