UP Government: a mob by itself

The incident in Chingravati village, in Bulandshahr district of Uttar Pradesh in which Subodh Kumar Singh, a police officer was killed, is unlikely to surprise any one who knows about the situation in that part.

Ever since a man clad in saint's clothes and adept at creatinng communal riots by spreading hatred among the people, became chief minister bizarre things have been happening there. Since he took office as chief minister in March 2017, 60 people have been killed in official 'encounter deaths' alone by now. In all, 1,100 encounters were stage managed in the state in which 370 got injured. Despite the intervention of National Human Rights Commission, the model of action there has not seen any change. It is not only that things are moving in this manner, but more insidious is the stance of the chief minister that they have to move in this manner. One of his statements, made on 19 November 2017 went like this: Criminals will either be jailed or killed in encounters. That had prompted none other than the National Human Rights Commission to say that the chief minister's statement was a challenge to the rule of law. Who the criminals in the eyes of Yogi Adityanath and his movement are, can be guessed by any one. The type of governance ruling the roost in the state is one that blatantly violates criminal procedure laws and constitutional principles. In other words, UP is a state where the government itself has become a violent mob. For that very reason, incidents like the one that happened on Monday in Bulandshahr, are not at all unexpected; they were a natural result of the social atmosphere created by the chief minister himself.

Trouble started with a rumour that somewhere in the sugarcane yards of the village, remains of a slaughterd cow were spotted. Workers of Sangh Parivar outfits like Bajrang Dal and Hindu Yuvavahini blockaded the roads with such remains and unleashed violence. Subodh Kumar Singh is the police officer who tried to stop this violence. He was killed by shots that hit his head. That shows that the killing was not a slip of the hand from the mob out of any sudden provocation. It was clearly a Sangh Parivar crowd who were mobilized there with lethal weapons including guns. And Subodh was targeted not without reason: he was the police officer who made the enquiry and caught the culprits in the Mohammed Akhlaq lynching case of 2015 in Dadri, that had made headlines even in international media. It has to be inferred that this murder was with a determination that such a man was not to be spared. And Subodh Kumar's sister has come out in the open alleging that her brother was killed for his role in the enquiry of the Akhlaq case. Another way to see it is that this police officer was guilty of a major crime in the eyes of Yogi Adityanath and the Sangh Parivar movement, and therefore eliminating him became their goal.

What is more serious than what Subodh Kumar Singh's sister said is the statement by Om Prakash Rajbhar, himself a member of Yogi Adityanath's cabinet. Rajbhar, who is also the leader of Suheldev Bharatiya Samaj Party, an ally of the BJP in UP government, has already raised the criticism that Yogi has completely failed in law and order. Further, he alleged also that the events of Monday are part of an RSS-VHP conspiracy. The minister himself said that it was mysterious for such a thing to happen in the background of a Tablig jama'at conference taking place in Bulandshahr. If that is so, one has to preume that this was a big scheme planned by Sangh Parivar aiming at a major communal riot. Of late, more and more news has been coming out to the effect that with Lok Sabha elections approaching, the Sangh Parivar has been planning to create extensive riots in northern India. The programmes and communal propaganda, centred on Ayodhya are all part of this. It may be recalled that in the last Lok Sabha elections, it was the Muzaffarnagar riots that gave the BJP a big victory in Uttar Pradesh. Thus, such a party which conducts its political activity by diving the people and massacring them, is a liability and curse for the country as a whole. In short, Bulandshahr is a big reminder.