panchayat poll | SabrangIndia News Related to Human Rights Fri, 09 Apr 2021 06:55:24 +0000 en-US hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=6.2.2 https://sabrangindia.in/wp-content/uploads/2023/06/Favicon_0.png panchayat poll | SabrangIndia 32 32 Will Sangita Sengar talk about BJP’s beti bachao slogan when campaigning in UP? https://sabrangindia.in/will-sangita-sengar-talk-about-bjps-beti-bachao-slogan-when-campaigning/ Fri, 09 Apr 2021 06:55:24 +0000 http://localhost/sabrangv4/2021/04/09/will-sangita-sengar-talk-about-bjps-beti-bachao-slogan-when-campaigning/ Sangita Sengar is BJP panchayat poll candidate, husband is Kuldeep Singh Sengar ex BJP MLA convicted of raping a minor in th einfamous Unnao rape case

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The news that Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has declared its panchayat poll candidates who will contest in five districts would have barely made it to a brief mention. However it is the choice of  Sangeeta Sengar, who is the wife of former BJP MLA Kuldeep Singh Sengar, a man convicted in a rape case of a minor that should concern voters.

The BJP, which often repeats the slogan ‘beti bachao’ or ‘save/ protect daughters’, especially in Uttar Pradesh, where news of rapes, are reported regulrly, has now chosen to award the wife of a rape convict and given her the opportunity to be a people’s representative. 

Sangeeta, who was the Zila Panchayat Chairperson of Unnao from 2016 to 2021 and has been given a ticket from Fatehpur Chaurasi Tritaya to contest for the seat of Zila Panchayat member. According to news reports, 51 names were released for different Zila Panchayat wards in Unnao. According to a report in The Times of India, Sangeeta’s candidature “was approved by state BJP chief Swatantra Dev Singh and state general secretary (organisation) Sunil Bansal at a meeting held recently.” Three-tier panchayat elections are going to be held in four phases from April 15 in UP stated news reports.

Her huband, Kuldeep Singh Sengar has been a four-time MLA on the BJP ticket from Bangarmau and was arrested in 2017 on charges of of raping a minor. The case was widely reported and came to be known as the infamous ‘Unnao Rape Case’. Kuldeep Singh Sengar was removed from the BJP in August 2019, followed by his ouster from the Legislative Assembly. 

In December 2019 the Court found Kuldeep Sengar guilty,  in the high-profile case that sent shock-waves ever since it first came to light in April 2018, when the survivor tried to self-immolate outside UP Chief Minister Adityanath’s home demanding justice. Sengar’s co-accused Shashi Singh was acquitted. The court had then observed, “Sengar was a powerful person, the victim was a village girl, not from a cosmopolitan educated area which led to delay in filing cases. I found her statement truthful, unblemished that she was sexually assaulted and under threat”.

The Court convicted Sengar under section 376 (rape) of the Indian Penal Code as well as section 5(c) of POCSO Act for the offence of public servant committing penetrative sexual assault against a child. Reportedly, Kuldeep Sengar broke down after hearing the verdict in court. The survivor, now aged 19, was a minor at the time of the crime. 

The crime was committed in 2017, but the BJP took its own time to expel Sengar who used his political might to ensure he escaped justice for as long as he could. He was arrested only in April 2018, days after the survivor threatened to set herself ablaze. As a BJP candidate, Kuldeep Sengar had won the state Assembly polls from Bangarmau Assembly seat of Unnao in 2017. However, the seat fell vacant after he was convicted in the rape case and was expelled from the party. 

The CBI had chargesheeted Sengar for raping a minor and also for conspiring to implicate her father in a false case. The rape survivor’s father was assaulted and framed in a case of illegal firearms possession allegedly by the Sengar and his aides. He died in judicial custody on April 9, 2018, a day after the survivor tried to set herself ablaze outside UP CM Adityanath’s residence. In March last year, a Delhi court convicted BJP MLA Kuldeep Singh Sengar and six others of culpable homicide not amounting to murder in the death case of the Unnao Rape survivor’s father.

Related:

Ex-BJP MLA Kuldeep Sengar, brother convicted in Unnao rape survivor’s father’s death
Unnao rape case: Kuldeep Singh Sengar convicted
Unnao accident witness claims murder bid on self

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]]> Bombs and Bullets rule the day as Poschim Bongo goes to Panchayat polls https://sabrangindia.in/bombs-and-bullets-rule-day-poschim-bongo-goes-panchayat-polls/ Tue, 15 May 2018 09:54:27 +0000 http://localhost/sabrangv4/2018/05/15/bombs-and-bullets-rule-day-poschim-bongo-goes-panchayat-polls/ Poschim Bongo Panchayat polls began at 7am on Monday, May 14 and there have been a spate of violent attacks across the state ever since then. Although media reports have yielded conflicting statistics, multiple reports claim that, as of writing this, at least ten people have been killed in poll-related violence in the state.  Image: […]

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Poschim Bongo Panchayat polls began at 7am on Monday, May 14 and there have been a spate of violent attacks across the state ever since then. Although media reports have yielded conflicting statistics, multiple reports claim that, as of writing this, at least ten people have been killed in poll-related violence in the state. 

West Bengal
Image: PTI

Apu Manna and Yogeswar Ghosh were shot dead, allegedly by youth on a motorcycle, when they refused to leave the queue in which were waiting to cast their votes at a booth in Haschara in Nandigram II block. Taibur Gayen was killed in a crude bomb attack allegedly by supporters of the Trinamool Congress (TMC), the ruling party, in Amdanga in the North 24 Parganas district. A Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) worker, Tapan Mondal, was killed in Beldanga in Murshidabad in another bomb attack. In the Budhakhali gram panchayat in Namkhana in the South 24 Parganas district, Debu Das and his wife, Uma Das, were allegedly burnt to death by supporters of the TMC. SUCI supporters allegedly shot dead a TMC supporter, Ariful Gazi, in Kultali in the South 24 Parganas. 

Separately, 20 people were wounded in a low-intensity blast at a polling station in Shuktabari in the Coochbehar district; the wounded include the TMC candidate. In Birpara, five journalists were wounded when a mob attempted to capture a polling booth. There were also reports of of ballot boxes being allegedly robbed at gunpoint in Murshidabad. In Bhangar in the state’s North Dinajpur district, police engaged in lathi-charge and threw tear gas shells to disperse a mob after clashes took place, according to an SEC official. A Story

Since the nomination filing process began on April 2, the opposition parties–the Communist Party of India (Marxist) (CPM), BJP and Congress, have alleged that many of their candidates were unable to file their nomination papers because of the ruling TMC’s “terror tactics.”. The TMC has categorically denied any involvement in the alleged activities. CPM leader Sitaram Yechury wrote to West Bengal’s Election Commission on Monday, May 14, highlighting the deaths of Debu Das and his wife, and urging it to “intervene”. Yechury tweeted that the Election Commission “must act to restore faith in the process. Else it will be seen as complicit in TMC’s project of destroying democracy. Allowing TMC to get away with throttling democracy has implications well beyond West Bengal.” 

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