Lakhimpur Violence: Vehemently opposed Ashish Mishra’s bail plea, says UP govt; SC hearing on plea challenging bail tomorrow

The Uttar Pradesh government on Tuesday said it “vehemently opposed” the bail application by Ashish Mishra, the son of Union MoS Home Ajay Mishra, in the Lakhimpur Kheri violence case. It also rejected the victim families’ charge that the state government was shielding the minister’s son and not protecting the witness. 

Meanwhile, in its response in the Supreme Court to a plea challenging Mishra’s bail, the Uttar Pradesh government said it “vehemently opposed” the bail application by Ashish. It also rejected the victim families’ charge that the state government was shielding the minister’s son and not protecting the witness. 

The state government further told the top court that all witnesses are also regularly contacted by the police for appraisal of their security conditions. It said that the submission of the petition that State did not effectively oppose the bail application of the accused Ashish Mishra is completely untrue, reported news agency ANI.

Denying allegations that a witness was attacked over the Lakhimpur Kheri case, the Uttar Pradesh government has said they were attacked over a personal dispute involving throwing colours on Holi.

“Each witness has one armed police gunner. The families of the victims have one armed gunner each, along with permanent security guard and continuous monitoring through installed CCTV cameras, as well as barrier duty at their residence,” the government said, adding that in the most recent interaction, witnesses expressed satisfaction with security arrangements.

On March 16, the SC bench led by Chief Justice of India N V Ramana had issued a notice to the UP government seeking its response on the plea and had also directed it to ensure witness protection.

The Special Investigation Team (SIT) had named Ashish Mishra as the main accused in the knocking down of the farmers incident in its charge sheet submitted to the court

Farmers were staging protest in Tikonia viage on October 3 last year against the visit of deputy chief minister Keshav Prasad Maurya to Ajay Mishra’s native Banbir village when four of the agitating farmers were crushed under the wheels of a convoy of cars. In the subsequent violence, four others comprising two BJP workers, driver and a journalist were killed

Mishra was granted bail by the Lucknow bench of the Allahabad High Court on February 10. Granting the relief, it said though Mishra was accused of inciting the driver of a vehicle to run over the protesters, the driver and two co-passengers were also killed allegedly by protesters.

Given that there were thousands of protesters, the driver might have speeded up the vehicle to save himself, the court had reasoned. In this context, it also added that the killing of the driver and the co-passengers could not be overlooked.