3 min readLucknowMar 8, 2016 05:58 AM IST
First published on: Mar 8, 2016 at 01:05 AM IST
File photo of former Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Mayawati
TERMING the one-man judicial commission’s report on communal riots in Muzaffarnagar and neighbouring districts in 2013 as a “cover up” exercise, BSP chief Mayawati Monday said the panel was set up “not to punish the guilty” but to “absolve the Samajwadi Party government” of all charges.
“The report has disheartened the public, the same way the lackadaisical attitude of the SP government had when the riots had broken out,” said Mayawati, a day after the report was tabled in the Uttar Pradesh Assembly.
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“The commission was set up not to punish the guilty and deliver justice to affected people, but to give clean chit to the SP government. Giving a clean chit to the state government in such a big and organised riot is, in reality, a step that makes people lose faith in the system,” she said.
The 700-page report of the judicial commission concluded that intelligence failure and laxity on the part of police led to the violence that left more than 60 people dead. It is, however, silent on the role of the Akhilesh Yadav government in the conflagration and has accused the media of putting out exaggerated reports and spreading rumours that fuelled violence.
Mayawati said that the SP government failed to act strictly against people found prima facie guilty for inciting riots, including BJP leaders. Those who incited and indulged in riots “roamed around like heroes” because of “casual approach” of the state government.
The former chief minister said it has become impossible for the poor, Dalits, backwards and Muslims to get security or justice for the loss of their lives, property and religion. “It is time for the people, especially Muslim community, to think what is the cost of their lives, property and religion under the SP government,” she said.
While the Supreme Court had taken the Akhilesh Yadav government to task, the Sahai Commission’s report has “ridiculed itself” by fixing the blame on low-level police and administrative officials, because “such reports are not written even at the level of a commissioner”, she added.
Mayawati said Akhilesh Yadav government may be feeling relaxed because of the report, but the “black shadow of the riots and the “SP government’s conspiring policy” is imprinted in the minds and hearts of the people”.
“Akhilesh Yadav government will definitely have to suffer its result,” she said.
File photo of former Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Mayawati
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