Police say situation tense in Allahabad

Lucknow: Violence erupted in Allahabad on Tuesday after Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) leader Rajesh Yadav was shot dead on Tuesday morning.

The BSP leader was shot at about 2.30 am outside the Allahabad University’s Tarachand Hostel, where he had gone to meet someone along with a friend. Eyewitnesses said that the BSP leader and his friends had an argument with a group of people, who threw stones at their car and then shot the politician in his stomach.

Rajesh Yadav, who had contested this year’s Assembly elections from Bhadohi, died even as his friends drove him to a nearby private hospital.

His attackers escaped but the police found two empty cartridges inside the BSP leader’s SUV.

Rajesh Yadav’s supporters went on rampage as soon as the news of the incident went around.

A mob of about 50 people set fire to two buses and damaged a private hospital. The mob also attacked journalists there, snatching and breaking their cameras and mobile phones. They also set fire to buses near the India Press roundabout. The violent protests were centred on the Georgetown and Colonelganj areas of Allahabad, close to where Mr Yadav was murdered, the police said.

The police said they were trying to control the violent mob and described the situation as tense.

Meanwhile, in a statement, BSP president Mayawati has termed the murder of Rajesh Yadav as a political murder.

“After a series of casteist killings, political murders are taking place in the BJP government,” she said. Ms Mayawati has directed state BSP president Ram Achal Rajbhar to meet the family of the deceased and take all possible steps to ensure justice to them.

Earlier on March 20, another BSP leader, Mohammad Shami, had been shot dead near his house, barely hours after the Yogi Adityanath government was sworn in.