Zee Media Bureau/Hemant Abhishek
Mumbai: Congress leader Sanjay Nirupam on Saturday stirred a hornet`s nest by linking the murder of a techie in Pune with the onset of campaigning for the Maharashtra Assembly Elections.
Nirupam accused the BJP of “fanning communal hatred” in the state through its “pocket organisations”.
Reflecting on the Congress` disastrous show in the Lok Sabha polls, Nirupam said that there were many reasons due to which people were not happy with the party.
"Such was the environment that even if (Narendra) Modi ji were a Congress candidate, he would have lost," said Nirupam whilst looking back at the election results.
Subtly hinting at a conspiracy angle to the murder, Nirupam told a news channel that the lynching of the Muslim youth was orchestrated at rousing communal tension in the state in purview of the impending Assembly polls.
Nirupam suggested that the manner in which selective details from the investigation report sent by the Maharashtra government to the Centre were leaked by the Ministry of Home Affairs also hinted at a bigger conspiracy.
“It is a leaked report. We cannot say with authority what is written in the report as we have not seen it. Instead of leaking reports, the central government should act,” he said.
Nirupam said that Congress in Maharashtra is concerned that “some sort of communal hatred is being fanned by BJP through its pocket organisations.”
“Assembly elections are going to take place in the state this year and the incident (of killing of techie) has happened in Pune. In the same manner, BJP had fanned communal tension in Uttar Pradesh before the Lok Sabha polls after some incidents in Muzaffarnagar.
“This is BJP’s style of functioning. Wherever they have to fight elections, such communal sentiments are fanned. We apprehend that BJP or its supporters fomented trouble in Muzaffarnagar, they are going to orchestrate same thing here,”
he said.
The Congress leader was referring to the murder of 27-year old techie, Mohsin Sadiq Shaikh, who was lynched by a mob after certain derogatory Facebook posts surfaced last week.
Shaikh, hailing from Solapur, was attacked with hockey sticks and rods near Hadapsar and beaten to death. The killing was ostensibly provoked by the derogatory Facebook posts - which he had nothing to do with.
