The Hindu : Front Page : Congressmen, police injured as Gandhinagar rally turns violent

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Friday, Mar 09, 2007
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Congressmen, police injured as Gandhinagar rally turns violent

Special Correspondent

PHOTO: PTI

WIELDING LATHIS: Policemen resort to force to disperse Dalit activists of the Congress who turned violent during a rally in Gandhinagar on Thursday.

GANDHINAGAR: The police resorted to lathicharge and lobbed teargas shells after a Dalit rally organised by the Congress turned violent and its participants started throwing stones on them here on Thursday. The participants were irked at bring prevented from marching to the Assembly building.

At least 30 persons, including six policemen, were injured. More than 100 Congress leaders and workers, including B.K. Hariprasad, All-India Congress Committee general secretary who is in charge of Gujarat affairs; AICC joint secretary and former Union Minister Mukul Wasnik; State president Bharat Solanki, and leader of the Opposition in the Assembly Arjun Modhvadia, were detained. They were later released.

The Congress leaders blamed the police for the violence and threatened to take the fight to the streets all over the State.

Mr. Solanki said the police had "clear instructions" from the Narendra Modi Government to "use force" to disrupt the rally "at all costs." He claimed that the police first threw stones on the rally participants and later used water cannon, teargas shells and resorted to " the unprovoked lathicharge" to prevent them from demonstrating in front of the Assembly. The police "misbehaved" with women workers on International Women's Day, he alleged.

Congress workers in every district and taluk headquarters would organise morchas protesting against the "police brutality."

Walkout in Assembly

The lathicharge episode had its echo in the Assembly, where the entire Opposition walked out in protest against the Government's alleged refusal to take note of the incident. It demanded that Minister of State for Home Amit Shah make a statement on the incident.

Earlier, Speaker Mangaldas Patel referred to the Privileges Committee a motion moved by Parliamentary Affairs Minister Ashok Bhatt alleging that some "leaflets" on the rally were distributed to Congress members inside the House. The Congress members protested, claiming that the leaflets were not distributed and were only "brought in."

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