Suresh Rana, Bhartiya Janata Party's (BJP) candidate from Shamli district of Uttar Pradesh, for the upcoming assembly election on Saturday stoked controversy saying curfew will be imposed in Kairana, Deoband and Moradabad if he wins the poll.
A video of Rana making the statement has gone viral on social media. Rana is already an MLA from Thana Bhawan.
"Yadi maidan maar liya to Kairana, Deoband, Moradabad mein curfew lag jayega mitron..isliye keh raha ki March 11 ka din hoga...Bharat Mata ki Jai ka naara lagate hue Shamli se Thana Bhawan tak juloos niklega,” he said, addressing BJP workers on Saturday.
Meanwhile, Rana has came up with a clarification, saying if his party comes to power then the state will see the exit of goons.
"Due to the fear of hooligans, extortion, the people migrated from western Uttar Pradesh. There is no village or town where migration did not take place due to these reasons. So, I meant to say that if the BJP comes to power in UP then these goons, extortionists will migrate and not the innocents," said Rana.
Suresh Rana was earlier named as key accused in the Muzaffarnagar riots by the local police. Polling in Thana Bhawan is scheduled for February 11. The results will be announced on March 11.
Last year, Kairana grabbed attention when BJP MP Hukum Singh released a list of Hindu families which the MP claimed had left their homes and fled because of "threat and extortion by criminal elements belonging to a particular community."
Political parties, especially Congress and Samajwadi Party, had slammed BJP for trying to stoke communal tension in Uttar Pradesh ahead of assembly elections in the state.
Later, in September 2015, a probe team of the National Human Rights Commission found that many families "migrated" due to threats pertaining to "increase in crime" and "deterioration" of the law and order situation there.
The 775-page report on the 2013 Muzaffarnagar riots of Justice Vishnu Sahay Commission blamed the BJP and the ruling Samajwadi Party for the violence in Muzaffarnagar. Justice Sahay was appointed by the ruling Samajwadi Party government to look into the reasons behind the riots that left over 63 dead and rendered over 55,000 homeless.
