By IANS
Lucknow : The punishment was swift. The method unconventional. Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister invited her party MP Uma Kant Yadav to her residence only to have him arrested and removed from the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) for going on a rampage in his hometown Azamgarh.
While an unsuspecting Yadav walked into the chief minister's residence only to be arrested and suspended from the primary membership of the BSP, Mayawati also expelled his son from the party. Both have been sent to jail.
Yadav, who has 33 cases of heinous crimes including murder pending against him, was arrested Wednesday morning when he came to Mayawati's home to give an explanation about the violent incidents in Azamgarh the day before.
The MP had allegedly set ablaze three shops and some houses in Palia-Mafi village in Azamgarh district, about 350 km from here, on Tuesday. Accompanied by his son Dinesh, he is even said to have fired shots in the air when some villagers resisted.
Yadav was stated to have gone on the rampage because a shop-owner, Feroz Ahmad, refused to comply with his diktat to pull down the shops. The MP owns a huge chunk of land behind the shops.
According to reports, Yadav and his henchmen left the scene only after the shops were razed. A first information report (FIR) was registered against him after villagers protested by blocking the Lucknow-Azamgarh highway.
He rushed to Lucknow to meet party supreme Mayawati when an explanation was sought. It was only on arriving there did he realise that he had been trapped.
Having gathered all the details of the incident, Mayawati refused to meet him and instead directed Principal Home Secretary K. Chandramauli and state police chief G.L. Sharma to put him behind bars.
"Police teams were waiting for him at the chief minister's residence," Sharma told reporters, adding that the MP and his son were booked under various provisions of the Indian Penal Code and sent to jail.
With the dramatic arrest, Mayawati has sent out a clear message that she would not tolerate any nonsense, particularly where law and order was concerned.
Shortly after assuming office earlier this month, the chief minister had sternly warned party members at various levels to not take undue advantage of their position.
The fourth time chief minister had also said that restoring law and order in Uttar Pradesh, India's most populous state, would be her top priority.