Priyanka released, joins Rahul to go to Lakhimpur Kheri

Congress leaders Rahul Gandhi and Priyanka Gandhi Vadra left for Lakhimpur Kheri Wednesday evening from a PAC guest house in Sitapur where she was kept in detention since Monday morning.

Sitapur Sub-Divisional Magistrate (Sadar) Pyarelal Maurya said that Priyanka Gandhi has been released from detention.

On their way to the violence-hit Lakhimpur Kheri from Sitapur, Rahul and his sister Priyanka Gandhi are travelling in one vehicle, while Congress leaders Randeep Surjewala and Deepinder Hooda are in another.

Punjab Chief Minister Charanjit Singh Channi and his Chhattisgarh counterpart Bhupesh Baghel are in another vehicle.

Sources said they may first stop at Nighashan in Lakhimpur district, the native place of journalist Raman Kashyap who also died in Sunday's violence. Nighashan is around 100 km from Sitapur.

Gandhi had reached the Sitapur guest house on his way to Lakhimpur Kheri from the Lucknow airport in his own vehicle. He had staged a brief dharna at the airport after initially being asked to travel in a police vehicle.

Gandhi had reached the Chaudhari Charan Singh airport in Lucknow this afternoon from Delhi along with Channi, Baghel and Congress general secretaries K C Venugopal and Randeep Surjewala.

"Rahul Gandhiji along with Punjab Chief Minister Charanjit Singh Channi and Chhattisgarh Chief Minister Bhupesh Baghel have left for Lakhimpur Kheri from the Lucknow airport," UP Congress spokesperson Ashok Singh told PTI in the afternoon.

In a tweet, Surjewala announced that the Punjab and Chhattisgarh governments will provide Rs 1 crore assistance to the families of each farmer and journalist killed in the Sunday violence.

Television footage from the airport showed officials telling Gandhi to take the police vehicle, which he did not agree to and sat on a dharna there.

”We want to go in our own vehicles, but they want that we should go in their vehicle. I want to know why are you not allowing me to go? First, I was told that I can go in my own vehicle, now you are saying that you will go in a police vehicle. They are doing some mischief,” Gandhi told reporters.

Talking to the press at the airport, Gandhi said he or Priyanka being sent to jail was irrelevant as the main question was ”people being crushed by criminals”, referring to the Lakhimpur Kheri episode.

”Those who should have been in jail are not being put in jail. We are being stopped from meeting the aggrieved families of the farmers," he said.

He also hit out the UP government after he was not allowed to exit the Chaudhari Charan Singh airport, where a group of CRPF personnel were seen preventing his movement out of the airport, despite permission being granted to visit Lakhimpur Kheri.

"See this, is the permission! This is the permission of the UP government,” Gandhi said, gesturing towards the security personnel who had formed a human-chain to prevent his movement.

"I want to ask them, that I am a citizen of the country and have come to UP and want to go (to Lakhimpur Kheri). Now, why am I not allowed to go," he questioned of the government.

"Definitely, there is some mischief," he said, responding to a query from the press.

Asked about Ashish Mishra, the son of Union minister Ajay Mishra who is accused in the case, Gandhi told the press to ask this question to the government.

Unable to move out of the airport, Gandhi along with Channi, Baghel and Deepender Singh Hooda, staged a sit-in inside the airport and said they would not end their dharna until they are allowed to go to Lakhimpur.

”Until they allow me to go, I will sit here. Farmers are being oppressed and looted, and the farmers understand this," he said, adding, ”Everybody knows for whom these laws have been made.”

After he left the airport, it took Gandhi a couple of hours to reach the Provincial Armed Constabulary guest house in Sitapur, around 88 km from Lucknow, where Priyanka Gandhi was kept in detention since Monday morning.

She was on her way to meet the families of farmers killed in Sunday's violence in Lakhimpur Kheri when she was stopped.

Earlier in the day, the state government had denied permission to Rahul Gandhi for the visit, and an official spokesperson had said that no one would be allowed to visit the violence-hit district to vitiate its atmosphere.

Later, the state government allowed Gandhi, his sister Priyanka Gandhi Vadra and three other Congress leaders to visit the violence-hit district.

"Permission has been given to five leaders of Congress, including Rahul Gandhi and Priyanka Gandhi Vadra, to visit Lakhimpur," Additional Chief Secretary, Information, Navneet Sehgal told PTI.