Nand Kishor Gurjar, a lawmaker of the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) on Thursday asked governor Anandiben Patel to act against officials, who he said, had denied the family of the Hathras gang-rape victim the right to perform her last rites.
Gurjar, who represents Loni assembly constituency of Ghaziabad near national capital Delhi, said the police had hastily performed the last rites of the 19-year-old woman in violation of religious beliefs of Hindus not to cremate the dead after sunset.
The family of the 19-year-old Dalit victim had alleged that they had been forced by UP police to perform her last rites in the stealth of the night. The police said they had the consent of the kin. Opposition parties have slammed the Yogi Adityanath government over the hurried cremation, arguing that it was meant to suppress protests.
Gurjar claimed that a ‘political syndicate’ was at work along with officials to paint the BJP as anti-dalit and the administration’s decision to cremate the woman past midnight was part of this conspiracy.
“The entire thing appears to be the handiwork of top officials from Lucknow to Hathras to malign the image of the government. It just cannot happen that such acts that are against the spirit of ‘sanatana dharma’ – of not cremating the dead at night and denying family the right to even lend a shoulder to their daughter’s bier – would be allowed without the consent of senior officials like UP DGP and others,” the lawmaker said in a letter to the governor.
“The unfortunate incident in Balrampur too appears to be the handiwork of this syndicate about whom I had briefed the chief minister in the past,” he said demanding that officials be tried for murder and the cases against them be tried in a fast track court.
