Mayawati says her party workers first to visit Hathras family

BSP leader Mayawati said that her party members were the first to visit the family of the murdered woman in Hathras. She said the police had facilitated a meeting of the BSP's fact-finding team.

Lucknow: Condemning police lathi charge and misbehaviour with opposition leaders and media who wanted to meet the Hathras victim's family, Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) president Mayawati on Monday claimed that representatives from her party were the first ones to visit them on September 28, the day the 19-year-old Dalit woman was shifted to Delhi's Safdarjung Hospital.

A day later she succumbed to brutal assault injuries, unleashing attacks by the opposition leaders and a section of media on the BJP-led state government. Mayawati said that police facilitated a meeting of the BSP delegation, who went there to find the facts, with the victim's family.

She added that the report, submitted to her by the delegation, was so sad that it forced her to go to the media.

In a series of two tweets, the BSP chief said: "After the Hathras gang rape scandal, a BSP delegation went there first on September 28 to meet the victim's family and know the correct facts. They were called to the (local) police station to talk to them (family). The report (that I received) after the talks was very sad, which forced me to go to the media," she tweeted on Monday, days after several political leaders met the family last week.

"The misbehaviour with the media after that and the lathi charge by police on opposition leaders yesterday and the day before that is very condemnable and shameful. Advice to the government to change its arrogant and dictatorial attitude, otherwise, the roots of democracy will weaken," she said in another tweet.

A day after Congress leaders Priyanka and Rahul Gandhi were stopped from reaching Hathras district and later arrested on October 1, a delegation of Trinamool Congress, including MP Derek O'Brien, was roughed up by the Uttar Pradesh Police on October 2. On Sunday, the UP Police lathi-charged the Rashtriya Lok Dal (RLD) and Samajwadi Party (SP) workers in Hathras after they allegedly broke barricades to reach the victim's village in large numbers.

Prem Prakash Meena, Sub-Divisional Magistrate (SDM) of Hathras Sadar, had said that they had made it clear in the morning itself that not more than five people would be allowed in the small village as there could be a law and order situation. "A delegation from Samajwadi Party and RLD came in. We let five members each from both the parties go inside. But eventually, their workers started to push around and misbehave with lady constables. To disperse the crowd, we had to use minor force," Meena said. Earlier, Section 144 of CrPC was imposed, restricting gathering of more than five people, in Hathras.

The incident surrounds a 19-year-old woman who was brutally assaulted in the village on September 14. She was admitted to Jawaharlal Nehru Medical College of Aligarh Muslim University and later shifted to Safdarjung Hospital in New Delhi. The body was taken to her native place and cremated in the early hours the following day.

(ANI)