New Delhi: Assam Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma Tuesday instructed the state Deputy General of Police (DGP) to file a case against Congress leader Rahul Gandhi for “provoking the crowd” after a clash broke out between Congress workers and police personnel on the outskirts of Guwahati.
Rahul’s Bharat Jodo Nyay Yatra was reportedly stopped from entering the Assam capital earlier in the day which incensed Congress workers. Party workers then smashed barricades and engaged with the police.
Rahul later addressed party workers and called them “babbar sher” or lions, saying they had broken barricades but not the law.
After the incident, Himanta put up a post on X accusing Rahul and his party cadres of “unruly behaviour” and deploying “naxalite tactics”.
He posted a video of Congress workers bringing down bulwarks, and said: “These are not part of Assamese culture. We are a peaceful state. Such ‘naxalite tactics’ are completely alien to our culture.
These are not part of Assamese culture. We are a peaceful state. Such “naxalite tactics” are completely alien to our culture.
I have instructed @DGPAssamPolice to register a case against your leader @RahulGandhi for provoking the crowd & use the footage you have posted on your… https://t.co/G84Qhjpd8h— Himanta Biswa Sarma (@himantabiswa) January 23, 2024
On Monday, the day of the pran pratishtha at Ayodhya’s Ram Mandir, Rahul was denied entry into a local shrine in Nagaon, Assam.
Rahul was trying to enter Batadrava Than, the birthplace of Assamese saint and social reformer Srimanta Sankardeva.
Asked why he was stopped as the shrine was open for all, Rahul Gandhi said, “I don’t know. Perhaps only one person can enter a temple today”, taking a jibe at Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who led the prayers in Ayodhya on Monday.
The Congress high command had turned down the invite to the Ram Mandir event, calling it a “political project” of the BJP and the RSS.
Rahul’s companion in the march, Congress communications in-charge Jairam Ramesh said the decision to stop the party workers was due to pressure from the the BJP-ruled state government.
The administration, however, said the Vaishnava monastery was expecting a lot of people in the first half of Monday, coinciding with the pran pratishtha ceremony in Ayodhya. The management said it feared logistical challenges if Rahul visited before 3 pm.
Himanta Biswa Sarma also questioned Rahul’s choice of date to visit the shrine. “I saw a news story in the national media yesterday that… ‘While Narendra Modi will do pran pratishtha, Rahul Gandhi will be in the birthplace of Srimanta Sankardeva. That is a wrong analogy. I request Rahul to go in the evening. Please do not go in the timeframe when the pran pratishtha is going on. Do not bring Assam in a bad light,” he said Monday.
Also read: Rahul protests after bid to visit Assam shrine on ‘pran pratishtha’ day fails. Ram bhajans sung at sit-in