Lucknow: Congress workers from across Uttar Pradesh clashed with police and climbed barricades while attempting to lay siege to the Vidhan Sabha in Lucknow on Tuesday under the MGNREGA Bachao Sangram campaign. The protesters alleged that the administration, acting on government directions, tried to stop the programme using force and preventive detentions.
According to Congress leaders, police issued legal notices to party workers over the past two days and detained several at their homes to prevent them from reaching the state capital. Despite restrictions and barricades, thousands of workers managed to reach Lucknow on the call of Uttar Pradesh in charge Avinash Pandey and state Congress president Ajay Rai to stage the Assembly gherao.
Large contingents of police were deployed and roads around the Congress office were sealed with barricades, turning the area into a high security zone. As Congress workers marched towards the Vidhan Sabha, they clashed with police at multiple points and climbed over barricades to push ahead with the protest. The party alleged that police resorted to baton charge to disperse the protesters, in which Ajay Rai and several leaders and workers sustained injuries.
The protest was held against what the party termed anti people policies of the state government, alleged attempts to weaken the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act, delays in wage payments to workers and the adverse impact on rural livelihoods. Despite barricades and police resistance, protesters raised slogans and continued their march, leading to scuffles and heated exchanges between police and workers.
The administration later detained Avinash Pandey and several senior leaders and workers and took them in buses to a temporary detention facility at Eco Garden.
Addressing party workers, Avinash Pandey said MGNREGA was not just an employment scheme but the backbone of the rural economy. He said the scheme had provided livelihood support to migrant workers during the Covid period and strengthened income, infrastructure, agriculture, women empowerment and social security. He alleged that the Centre was weakening the scheme and said the Congress had launched nationwide protests to save it through chaupals, dharnas and awareness programmes in every district.
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Ajay Rai condemned the police action and said the Congress would continue to raise the issues of MGNREGA workers, the poor and the marginalised from the streets to the legislature. He said baton charges and repression would not deter party workers and warned that the agitation would be intensified if the government failed to take positive decisions on MGNREGA and other public interest issues.
Congress Legislature Party leader Aradhana Mishra Mona said MGNREGA had provided dignified employment to women in their villages and weakening the scheme reflected an anti women approach. She said the core idea of the programme was to ensure employment in villages so that workers were not forced to migrate in search of work.
