NEW DELHI, 8 September 2004 — A newspaper agent sustained burn injuries in Uttar Pradesh yesterday as rampaging supporters of former Chief Minister Mayawati burned copies of a newspaper at several places, protesting derogatory words used against her.
The news agent in Hatras town of western Uttar Pradesh was hospitalized with 60 percent burn injuries.
Dainik Jagran, a leading Hindi daily whose Ghaziabad edition printed the headline described as derogatory by Mayawati’s supporters, apologized and announced the sacking of the employee responsible for it.
Mayawati, who heads the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP), denounced the news report and said: “This only confirms my opinion about the bias that prevails in the minds of a large section of the media against me and the BSP.
“I know everyone is not like that but these are the ones who have given a bad name to the entire media,” she said.
Mayawati, who denied knowledge of violence caused by her supporters, said she would take the newspaper to court for the slight.
Supporters of the Dalit leader burned copies of the daily in Lucknow, Meerut, Ghaziabad and other parts of the state.
Police thwarted an attempt early Tuesday morning by several hundred BSP volunteers to storm the newspaper’s office in Lucknow.
In the 1990s, Mayawati had marched to a newspaper’s office here along with her mentor Kanshi Ram, taking umbrage against a similar news report and had laid siege to its office with nearly 50,000 supporters.
Meanwhile, the Congress party has launched a no-hold barred attack against the ruling Samajwadi Party in the state.
Congress, which is extending outside support to the government in Uttar Pradesh, yesterday said it might reconsider its support to the government if it failed to improve law and order situation in the state and solve problems confronting the people.
“Being a supporting party, Congress is not bound to support the government even if it fails to deliver,” Satyavrat Chaturvedi, in-charge of party’s affairs in the state, told reporters here.
“We have been warning government time and again to improve the law and order situation and redress problems faced by the people. But all this is of no avail and our patience is running out,” he said.
At present, the party was not thinking of withdrawing support but a right decision would be taken at the right time, Chaturvedi said. Recent SP overtures to the BJP suggested that the Congress support to the Mulayam Singh Yadav government was an exercise in futility, he said.
“Congress has supported SP to keep communal parties at bay but recent developments like former Premier A.B. Vajpayee’s praise for the state government on the law and order front showed that the two parties had an understanding with each other,” Chaturvedi said.
His party would have no relations with those having truck with communal parties, he said.
