In a bizarre incident, a group of ruling Biju Janata Dal (BJD) workers allegedly thrashed a woman who had met Prime Minister Narendra Modi during his recent visit to the state.
It is said that the woman, who has been identified as Yamuna Mandal, had handed over a letter to the Prime Minister elaborating to him the grievances she and other women continue to face under the Naveen Patnaik government.
Angered by the act, the BJD workers stormed into the woman’s residence here and brutally thrashed her. The victim hails from a village in Jagatsinghpur district.
The matter came to light when the victim approached police and filed an FIR.
According to the victim, the goons even threatened her with consequences if she reported the matter to the police.
“I had gone to meet Modiji. When I returned here on Sunday, they (BJD workers) thrashed me. The incident took place at around 10 am. They said that I can’t harm them even if I meet Modi. They abused me as well,” the lady said.
“They all must be arrested. The main dispute is about a forest. Tahsildar and police station in-charge couldn’t solve the problem. Officials are not taking measures to resolve the dispute,” Gatikrishna Sripathi, a villager said.
On April 15, a group of five women from the village had gone to Bhubaneshwar to meet PM Modi and submitted a memorandum to him. According to the BJD workers, media highlighted the matter aggressively.
Reacting to the news, Union Minister Dharmendra Pradhan, who hails from Odisha, said that ‘BJD was torturing poor people for voting in favour of the BJP in the panchayat elections’.
“The poor people voted for BJP and getting angry on that the goons attacked a poor lady. She went to the police station & filed FIR but no investigation was done. When the PM came to Orrisa on April 15 and when he was doing his road show in Bhubaneshwar, she gave her problems in writing to the PM,” he said.
“She told him about the problems… this angered the ruling party and she was attacked,” he added.
Pradhan informed that the representatives from the BJP’s state unit had yesterday met the DG and demanded strict action against the goons.
He said that ‘there can be political disagreements’ but ‘something like this is absolutely not right’.
The minister also asked CM Patnaik and state Home Minister to order a thorough probe into the incident and bring the culprits to book.
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