Chhattisgarh BJP files complaint against Atal Bihari Vajpayee’s niece Karuna Shukla

The BJP in Chhattisgarh has filed a police complaint and sought an FIR be registered against Congress leader Karuna Shukla, the niece of former prime minister and Bharat Ratna Atal Bihari Vajpayee, and several other Congress functionaries. The issue was relating to Vajpayee’s ashes which, according to Shukla and others, were immersed and was gathering dust at the BJP office only.

In an incident, according to National Herald, Karuna Shukla and Bhupesh Baghel along with other Congress leaders and with an army of supporters to throng the main gate of the BJP office and demanded the urn with ashes. With intense sloganeering, the situation was about to spiral out of control where police had to intervene to prevent any further trouble.

The Congress leaders alleged that the urn containing Vajpayee’s ashes was stored in the BJP office and was not immersed according to rituals. Enraged by the alleged apathy, the Congress leaders barged into Ekatma Parisar, the divisional office of the saffron party in Raipur on October 19.

“We had written to the collector, the superintendent of police and election commission informing them about the protest. Despite this, they used their brute force on me,” Shukla was quoted as saying by NDTV. She also added that the Chhattisgarh BJP had forgotten to immerse Vajpayee’s ashes. Shukla joined Congress ahead of the 2014 general elections.

“In the media room in the BJP office, there is a sack with an urn inside it. People there told us that these are Atalji’s ashes. The ashes were supposed to be taken to a particular block but the BJP didn’t take them,” Vikas Tiwari, party spokesperson, was quoted as saying.

However, the complaint against Shukla and others were registered at the Moudhapara police station on Wednesday by Chhattisgarh State Industrial Development Corporation chairman Chhagan Mundra, party’s Legal Cell in-charge Naresh Gupta and the state BJP spokesperson Sanjay Shrivastava.

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