UP Police files FIR against Congress leader Pankaj Punia for controversial tweet

NEW DELHI: The Uttar Pradesh Police on Wednesday filed an FIR against Congress leader Pankaj Punia over an alleged derogatory tweet by him in context of the migrant workers' plight. The FIR was filed at the Hazratganj police station.

The UP Police filed the FIR on a complaint made by one Ashish Singh. 

Punia, an AICC member, had made a highly condemnable, insensitive and objectionable remark against the Hindu and the Sangh Parivar.

In his tweet, Punia also criticised UP Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath for his handling of migrant workers' crisis.

A complaint in this regard has also been filed in Ghaziabad.

Slamming the tweet, many Netizens have demanded that Punia`s account be suspended.

Punia's tweet came after the buses arranged by the Delhi Congress for transporting migrants were stopped at the Noida border.

Congress leaders alleged that the Gautam Buddha Nagar administration was not allowing the vehicles to enter.

Several senior Congress leaders - Rajeev Shukla, Sushmita Deb, Delhi Congress chief Anil Kumar Chaudhary and Rajiv Satav - had reached the flyway along with many others.

Former Rajya Sabha MP Rajeev Shukla said party leader Priyanka Gandhi Vadra has already asked the BJP government to use, if that party wants to, their own banners and posters. "Then where is the problem?" Shukla asked, adding there were no motorbikes among the vehicles.

Delhi Congress chief Anil Kumar Chaudhary said, "We are waiting for the Uttar Pradesh government`s permission. And as promised by Priyanka Gandhiji, we have come here with the buses to hand them to the state government.''

On Tuesday evening the UP government arrested state Congress chief Ajay Kumar Lallu along with several others after they sat in protest near the Agra border.

On Tuesday as the tiff escalated, Priyanka Gandhi, who is also in-charge of the eastern UP, said that out of 1,049 buses, 879 have been found fit by the state government and that the party would provide 200 more buses on Wednesday. 

She also urged the UP government not to delay the bus services for the stranded migrant workers willing to go back to their homes.