Lucknow, Sep 29 : On the eve of the Ayodhya title suits verdict by the Allahabad High Court, Chief Minister Mayawati tonight complained that enough security forces had not been made available to UP and the Centre would be fully responsible if any untoward incident took place.
"The state demanded 642 companies of the central forces against which only 52 companies had been allocated which is insufficient and if anything untowards happens then the Centre would be fully responsible," she said in a statement read out to reporters by state Cabinet Secretary Shashank Shekhar Singh.
Singh said the Chief Minister had written to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to make available enough central forces to deal with any eventuality in the aftermath of the verdict to be pronounced by the Lucknow bench of the Allhabad High Court tomorrow. "Centre has not taken our request seriously," Mayawati said.
Commenting on Union Home Minister P Chidambaram's statement that UP had a strength of 1.90 lakh personnel, which was sufficient to deal with the situation, she said this was not true.
Stressing that the demand for additional forces was justified, Mayawati said that to conduct free and fair elections in 2007, Centre had allocated 700 companies of para military forces. "This time also we needed adequate number of forces to deal with the situation. And if something happes for lack of force, Centre will be responsible", Mayawati said.
"To tackle possible communal tension, the government demanded 458 companies of central forces on August 6, besides another 143 companies were demanded for the security of disputed site at Ayodhya on September 1," she said.
Mayawati said that Director General of Police (DGP) personally met Union Home secretary on August 9 to press for additional forces. The state government also made a representation to Governor BL Joshi on Aug 12 urging him to request the Centre for more forces.
Besides, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh was also requested through separate letters to him on Sep 1 and Sep 13 respectively to provide the forces to maintain law and order post-Ayodhya title suit judgement, she said . "But nothing was done...this shows its insensitivity to deal such a serious matter", she said.
Asked whether the state government was apprehensive about law and order problems, Singh said that government had taken several steps to deal with the situation.PTI
