Lucknow: A seven-time MLA, who also happens to be the son of a former chief minister, has shot off a letter to Union Home Minister Amit Shah and BJP chief J.P. Nadda seeking their intervention in a police case lodged by him in Gorakhpur, home district of Uttar Pradesh CM Yogi Adityanath. The sitting BJP legislator from Caimpiyarganj in his letter claimed that he does not “trust the state machinery” to probe his complaint.
The development comes in the wake of Deputy CM Keshav Prasad Maurya’s seeming attempt to needle the chief minister, which the latter’s loyalists say is being viewed as an attempt to destabilise the CM’s chair.
In the letter dated 17 July, Fateh Bahadur Singh, a former minister and pro-tem speaker in the Assembly, claimed there has been no movement on a case lodged by him against members of a gang he has accused of hatching a conspiracy to kill him.
Reacting to the complaint, Gorakhpur police said the main accused named in the case happens to be the son of a BJP district panchayat member in Gorakhpur and that they have roped in the local STF unit, surveillance, SOG and SWAT teams to probe the matter.
Speaking to ThePrint, Singh said he wrote to the UP CM earlier this month seeking his intervention in ensuring action against those he accused of hatching a conspiracy to kill him. “I lodged an FIR at Pipiganj police station of Gorakhpur district, but I have information that the case has not been assigned to any investigating officer so far,” he said.
Singh claimed that history-sheeters, part of a gang, members of which were also involved in a case of bank loot, were behind the conspiracy and also have cases against them in several police stations across the state.
“There is a big gang behind this conspiracy and they collected Rs 1 crore to eliminate me. They contacted a shooter but he informed me about it. On Wednesday, I wrote a letter to BJP national president J.P. Nadda and Union Home Minister Amit Shah, asking them to take cognizance of the matter as I don’t trust the state government officials and police,” he said.
He added that the state police were yet to act on his complaint despite directions from the chief minister, which is what led him to believe that the cops were hand in glove with criminals and that’s why he decided that the matter be brought to the attention of Amit Shah and the BJP central leadership. Singh also claimed that he wrote the letter to Shah and Nadda because a softer approach is not to the liking of the state bureaucracy.
“Adhikariyon ko pyaar aur mohabbat raas nahi aa rahi,” he said.
(an affable approach is not to the liking of state government machinery)
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Accused is BJP functionary’s son: Cops
Reacting to Singh’s letter, the Gorakhpur police issued a statement confirming that the matter is under investigation and that among the accused is the son of a BJP district panchayat member.
According to the police, Rajiv Ranjan Chaudhary — one of the accused named by the MLA in his complaint — is the son of Saroj Devi, the BJP district panchayat member from Gorakhpur’s Bharohiya ward-I.
The police also said that Fateh Bahadur Singh said his “sources” alerted him about the alleged plot and that Chaudhary “collected money” and “hatched a conspiracy” to kill him.
Upon receiving the complaint, the investigation was handed over to the Superintendent of Police (North), SWAT, SOG and surveillance teams. Superintendent of Police, Gorakhpur, Dr Gaurav Grover said in a video statement Thursday. “The local unit of the STF was informed and they too were asked to verify the facts,” he added.
He also said that statements of persons have been recorded in connection with the complaint.
Further, Grover emphasised that Fateh Bahadur Singh is a Y+ category protectee, which entitles him to a detail of 11 police personnel, one guard and six personal security officers.
“This, too, has to be clarified that the mother of the person named by the MLA in his complaint is Saroj Devi who happens to be a member of the district panchayat from the BJP currently. Police have spoken to the MLA regularly in connection with the complaint lodged by him and action has been taken in connection with his security too,” he said.
District Magistrate, Gorakhpur, Krishna Karunesh, too, said that a thorough investigation is underway into the matter and special attention is being paid to the MLA’s security. “Multiple agencies have been roped in to probe his allegations and action will be taken on the basis of the outcome of the investigation,” said Karunesh.
Fateh Bahadur Singh: Power centre in Yogi’s bastion
Seven-time MLA Fateh Bahadur Singh has been associated with the Congress, BSP and NCP in the past. He also served as pro-tem speaker in the 17th Vidhan Sabha (2017).
Singh served as MLA from Maharajganj’s Paniyara assembly seat between 1991 and 2012 which he won first on a Congress ticket (1991) and later on a BSP ticket (2007). He later switched to the NCP and went on to win the Caimpiyarganj seat for the party in 2012.
But, he subsequently parted ways with the NCP and joined the BJP. He contested the 2017 and 2022 assembly polls on a BJP ticket and registered back-to-back wins.
Singh holds sway in the Maharajganj-Gorakhpur region from where CM Yogi belongs. His father and former chief minister Vir Bahadur Singh, too, was elected from the Paniyara seat multiple times and served as the chief minister from 24 September, 1985 to 25 June, 1988.
As Singh’s letter to Shah and Nadda surfaced, loyalists of Deputy CM Maurya circulated his statements to news channels in Lucknow.
Speaking to ThePrint, a UP BJP leader said Singh’s letter was another attempt to undermine the Uttar Pradesh chief minister.
Several UP BJP leaders including Ratnakar Mishra, the MLA from Mirzapur, and Devendra Pratap Singh, MLC from Gorakhpur-Faizabad, trained their guns on the state bureaucracy this past week. Ramesh Mishra, the BJP MLA from Badlapur, said the party’s central leadership must take a big step if it wishes to retain the state in the 2027 assembly polls.
Adding to criticism of the civil servants working closely with CM Yogi Adityanath, former state minister Moti Singh even claimed the scale of corruption seen at the tehsil- and police station-level now is something he never witnessed in his career spanning four decades.
(Edited by Amrtansh Arora)
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