Rahul Gandhi, Priyanka stopped at UP border on way to violence-hit Sambhal

Congress leaders Rahul Gandhi and Priyanka Gandhi were on Wednesday prevented by police from visiting the violence-affected Sambhal in Uttar Pradesh.

Rahul and other members of the entourage including K C Venugopal were stopped at the Ghazipur border between Delhi and Noida by the Uttar Pradesh Police to prevent them from proceeding to Sambhal.

Congress leaders were planning to meet family members of the victims of police firing after reaching Sambhal.

There was heavy chaos at the border after Congress workers gathered there confronting the police and blocking the highway.

Sambhal district authorities had requested neighbouring districts to stop them from entering the district. The DM has written to officers in Bulandshahr, Amroha, Ghaziabad, and Gautam Buddha Nagar, urging them to intercept the Congress team at the border.

The Congress leaders were attempting to visit Sambhal amid restrictions barring the entry of outsiders to the area. The restrictions were imposed after violence erupted over a survey of the Mughal-era Shahi Jama nMasjid, following a petition that claimed the site previously had a Hindu temple.

Curbs under Section 163 of the Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita 2023 (formerly known as Section 144) have been invoked in Sambhal, prohibiting the gathering of five or more people.

In the Lok Sabha, Congress MP Mohd Javed raised the issue of Leader of Opposition being stopped from going to Sambhal.

Congress and other INDIA parties walked out of the house in protest.

Rahul Gandhi said he had been denied his constitutional right.

‘We tried to go to Sambhal but have not been allowed by the police.

As the Leader of the Opposition in Lok Sabha I have the right to visit Sambhal but I have not been allowed to. I said I would go alone but that too is not acceptable to them. This is a new India but we will continue to fight,’ Gandhi wrote on X in Hindi.