Lucknow, Oct 19 (UNI) The Balia firing incident has given the Opposition another chance to corner the government over the deteriorating law and order situation in Uttar Pradesh and drawing Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) on backfoot.
On the other hand, there is a strong possibility of strict action being taken against the MLA who put the BJP into a fix by taking the side of the accused.
Dhirendra Pratap Singh, who is close to the party's local leader and Bairia MLA Surendra Singh, killed a man in front of the police and administrative officials in a dispute over allotment of a fair price shop on Oct 15.
Taking action into the matter, Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath had suspended a Circle Officer (CO) and an SDM.
However, the BJP MLA came forward to defend the accused and proved the Opposition's allegations of culprits committing crimes in the patronage of the BJP government and that the police administration cannot do anything to stop them.
The MLA, who had openly spoken in favor of the murder accused, was summoned by the party's state president Swatantra Dev Singh who had warned him to refrain from making unrestrained statements.
Adopting a serious attitude towards the incidents, party president JP Nadda spoke to Swatantra Dev Singh on call and asked him to warn Surendra Singh that if he favors the accused, it will not be taken lightly.
Party sources said that Mr Nadda, who is generally calm in nature, had seemed angry with the antics of Surendra Singh. He has stated in clear terms that they are in no mood to entertain such mannerisms of the party MLA. The MLA will have to steer clear of the investigation against the accused and strict action will be taken if he tries to speak in favor of the accused again or influence the probe.
Meanwhile, the Congress and the Samajwadi Party (SP) have been continuously lambasting the government over the Ballia incident. The SP workers also protested in Lucknow on Monday over the same incident and also handed over a memorandum pertaining to their demands to Kaiserbagh district office's DCP Gopal Chaudhary.
Notably, Surendra Singh had demanded an impartial probe into the incident in his meeting with Mr Swatantra Dev Singh in the party office on Sunday. He had also said that he was being falsely accused.
Earlier, Mr Surendra Singh had gone with Dhirendra Pratap Singh's family to get an FIR registered against the other side on Saturday. He had said that the other side had attacked Dhirendra's family and Jai Prakash died after they retaliated in self-defence.
UNI YK JAL 1742