PM’s ‘effigy’ may turn Governor heat on Jogi

According to highly placed sources, Governor Dinesh Nandan Sahay has taken exception to the effigy burning. He has conveyed his displeasure to state Home Minister Nand Kumar Patel, who was involved in organising the October 5 state bandh. ‘‘It is highly objectionable and also disgraceful,’’ Sahay wrote to Patel.

This is the first time the Governor has taken on the state government. Sahay, a retired IPS officer of the Bihar cadre, was a Samata Party member before being pitched into the governorship. For some time now, the BJP has been unhappy with Sahay, especially after he ignored opposition and approved the Lok Ayukta ordinance.

Raj Bhavan sources said Sahay is particularly unhappy at the way the effigies were thrashed with shoes, and with police inaction.

Local newspapers had carried photographs of Congress workers at work as police looked on. Sahay plans to summon Jogi to Raj

Bhavan when he returns from abroad and convey his feelings.

Some ministers’ statements on burning the effigies to protest against Jogi’s ‘‘arrest’’ have added to the trouble. BJP chief Venkaiah Naidu, who was in town the day the state observed a bandh, accused Jogi of violating the Constitution by defying the law in Delhi and then calling a bandh.

Today, the state BJP got back at the Congress by burning Jogi’s and Sonia Gandhi’s effigies at all district headquarters. They came out on the streets in Raipur town despite heavy police deployment. Senior BJP MLA Brij Mahan Aggarwal was present to oversee the proceedings.

State BJP chief Raman Singh said: ‘‘By burning Vajpayee’s effigies the Congress has shown disrespect to the person who deserves credit for the state’s creation. The BJP will reply to this disgraceful act.’’

The BJP now plans to call for an inquiry into the state’s irregularities in paddy purchase and allotment to private rice millers.

The Union Minister for Food and Civil Supplies will be in Raipur on October 12 to meet state officials after complaints about the state’s purchase of 19 lakh tonnes paddy last year.