Meerut: Six BJP workers held for poster stunt outside police station

The poster, which said “BJP karyakartaon ka thane main aana mana hai (BJP workers are not allowed to enter the police station)”, also had the name of Sant Saran Singh, the in-charge of Medical Police Station, and made it appear as if he had given the order.

“The act [of putting up the poster] has hurt the image of Meerut Police. We have arrested six persons in this regard,” Meerut SSP Prabhakar Chaudhary told The Indian Express.

According to the SSP, the origin of the matter was a property dispute involving a family in which the BJP workers got involved and reached the police station on Friday. “They were trying to put pressure on the in-charge to seek undue favour but when it was denied, they created a scene,” said Chaudhary.

Some of the party workers then held the poster outside the police station – to grab attention.

As pictures of them with the poster went viral on social media, a tweet from the UP Chief Minister’s official handle said, “The police stations and tehsils used to be mortgaged (to ruling party workers) during the tenure of the previous government. But no BJP worker ever goes to the police station or tehsil for any undue favour.”

Later at night, SP leader Akhilesh Yadav tagged a picture of the poster and tweeted, “This has happened for the first time in last six years that ruling party workers have been barred from police station. This really is the much-touted good governance of the BJP government.”

Hours later, the police lodged an FIR against the BJP workers.

According to the police, around a dozen BJP workers had stormed into the police station earlier in the day, demanding that the police should help a woman who was engaged in a property dispute with her in-laws after her husband died in October last year.

Police station in-charge Sant Saran Singh said he called the woman and her in-laws to the police station to broker peace.

“But some political workers created a scene and sat on a dharna inside the police station, seeking undue favour for the woman. They also put up a poster on the boundary wall and started raising anti-police slogans. I tried to convince them that the issue can be resolved amicably but they remained firm on their demand,” said Singh.