BJP protest brings Lucknow to a halt

BJP workers on Wednesday were lathicharged by the police and made to face water cannons for almost three hours when they attempted to gherao the Vidhan Sabha in protest against the breakdown of the law and order situation in the state.

Inside the state Assembly, BJP MLAs forced adjournments and stalled the House on the same issues at the same time. State BJP chief Keshav Maurya said that the party will continue to raise the issues about lawlessness, unemployment, atrocities against women and corruption, among others, on the floors of both the Houses and also continue to take to the streets. The BJP workers assembled at party headquarters and attempted to march towards Vidhan Bhavan even though the area had been heavily barricaded. A heavy deployment of police had been made and as the cops tried to push back the protesters, clashes took place leading to a lathicharge by the cops.

Scores of BJP workers, two police officials and half-a-dozen journalists were injured in the incident and have been admitted to the nearby civil hospital. For almost two hours, the face-off between the cops and the BJP workers continued after which the police used water cannons on the protesters. The traffic was thrown completely out of gear and schoolchildren were stranded at several paces for hours. Inside the state Assembly, BJP members squatted in the well of the House as soon as the Assembly convened and shouted slogans against the government. As a result of the commotion, the entire Question Hour had to be suspended. When the house re-assembled, slogan shouting continued and some BJP MLAs tore up the agenda and threw paper balls at the chair.

The BJP MLAs could be heard protesting against the lathicharged on party men outside the House, but nothing could be heard in the din.

The Speaker rushed through the day’s agenda amidst noisy scenes, while the Leader of the Opposition Gaya Charan Dinkar demanded a debate on the law and order situation and also the rationality of bringing a supplementary budget when merely 28 per cent of the money allocated in the main Budget had been spent in the first six months of the financial year.