Lucknow : The BJP on Friday upped the ante on the Kairana migration issue as a party delegation submitted a memorandum to the state Governor demanding a CBI inquiry into the alleged migration of people from Kairana town in Shamli district.
Earlier in the day party legislator Sangeet Som launched a Nirbhay yatra to Kairana but stopped it short of the town as the police did not allow him and his supporters to proceed further. A BJP delegation also met the Governor and apprised him of the visit to Kairana on June 15; in a 3-page memorandum they have described their visits to dozens of houses in as many localities, besides their interface with 200 persons in a guest house.
The memorandum said that everyone they met said that they were living in dread of criminals who were extorting money and they were not getting justice from the district administration. “They are forced to migrate because of this fear,” the memorandum said.
The memorandum also said that it was the duty of the state government to take action against the criminals rather than shrug of the migration as a bad dream. The BJP leaders also mentioned the names of those whom they had met and quoted them as saying that the district administration was giving patronage to a criminal gang.
The memorandum said that the BJP team needed more time to find the answers to several questions, such as how many Hindus had sold their property and migrated in four years; how many LPG connections were surrendered or transferred to other cities, how many arms licenses were issued to people of one community, and what action was taken against culprits.
Earlier in the day, prohibitory orders were clamp-ed in district and borders of Kairana were sealed as BJP MLA Sangeet Som suspended his march to the town and gave a 15-day ultimatum to the State government to bring back those who had allegedly migrated.
A rally by Samawadi Party, led by party leader Atul Pradhan, was also aborted outside Sardhana town limits. There was heavy deployment of police and the PAC. BJP MP Hukum Singh had a few days ago released a list of 346 families that were allegedly forced to flee the town, which has 85 per cent Muslim population. Kairana had witnessed communal riots in 2013. Singh later said that the migration was not communal in nature, but was more to do with the law and order situation. On Thursday, a delegation of leaders of five parties had visited the town and had hit out at the BJP for giving a “communal” angle to the issue. This delegation comprised KC Tyagi of Janata Dal (U), D. Raja of the CPI, Mohammad Salim of the CPI (M), D.P. Tripathi of the NCP and Manoj Jha of the Rashtriya Janata Dal.
