Priyanka Gandhi Vadra intensified her attack on the UP government by demanding that the panchayat polls of all such places where violence took place should be cancelled and held again.
On her second day of her visit to the state, Vadra visited Lakhimpur Kheri where a woman was manhandled, and her saree yanked during the filing of nominations to the Block Pramukh elections on July 8.
The woman was a proposer for a Samajwadi Party candidate, also a woman—whose nomination papers were snatched and torn.
In the widely circulated video, two men dressed in blue shirts, allegedly supporters of the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party, were seen pulling the palla of a pink saree clad woman as she walked towards the nomination centre. The video had drawn wide condemnation.
Vadra, after meeting the woman said, “The administration stood silent. No one tried to save her”.
“Is this what you want in your state”, she asked the media persons present.
“Elections are cancelled over small incidents of violence. They should be cancelled everywhere in the state from where there has been violence,” Vadra said.
She said her meeting with the women was a show of support. “She is my sister. I assured her that every woman in the country is standing with her.” She also said that she had assured the woman whose nomination papers were torn that she would realise her constitutional right to fight the election.
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On July 9, the state’s chief minister Yogi Adityanath had ordered the suspension of six policemen over the incident. The two attackers in the video had been booked on charges of sexual assault, rioting, undue influence at an election and robbery.
“The only officer who tried to save her was transferred,” said Vadra. She said that whoever- of ‘high’ or ‘low’ profile knew about the incident should be held accountable for it.
She also trained her guns on Prime Minister Narendra Modi saying that he had congratulated the CM on the party’s good showing in the panchayat elections despite the widespread violence.
