The names of Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leaders Varun Gandhi and his mother Maneka Gandhi were dropped from the fresh list of the BJP national executive. Bharatiya Janata Party has announced the list of 80-member national executive council Thursday.
While many Union Ministers and veteran leaders like LK Advani and Murli Manohar Joshi are on the list, party MPs and mother-son duo Maneka Gandhi and Varun Gandhi have been excluded from the executive council.
The removal comes even as Varun Gandhi has been quite vocal regarding the Lakhimpur Kheri incident and has been demanding an investigation into the incident.
BJP MP Varun Gandhi on Thursday shared a video allegedly showing farmers being run over in Uttar Pradesh's Lakhimpur Kheri district, an incident that led to eight deaths, and said that justice must be delivered before a message of arrogance and cruelty enters the minds of farmers. He also said that the protestors cannot be 'silenced through murder'.
Taking to Twitter, the MP from Uttar Pradesh's Pilibhit shared a video and wrote, "The video is crystal clear. Protestors cannot be silenced through murder. There has to be accountability for the innocent blood of farmers that has been spilled and justice must be delivered before a message of arrogance and cruelty enters the minds of every farmer." Notably, Gandhi has been vocal about the incident and wrote to UP Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath on Monday, and demanded strict action against culprits. He also suggested a Supreme Court-monitored CBI probe in a time-bound manner in the case.
He paid tribute to farmers killed in the incident and said that Rs 1 crore compensation should be given to the families of victims.
A total of eight people including four farmers died in the violence that took place in Lakhimpur Kheri on October 3. Of the eight killed, four were farmers, who were allegedly mowed down by vehicles driven by BJP workers travelling to welcome UP Deputy Chief Minister Keshav Prasad Maurya to an event in the area. The other four were two BJP workers, a driver of Union Minister of State for Home Ajay Kumar Mishra and a journalist working for a private television channel.