It was during the campaign for the parliamentary bypoll that seeds of communal discord, which became manifest on Sunday in Azamgarh, were sown. On April 10, BJP MP Yogi Adityanath, while campaigning for party candidate Ramakant Yadav, had announced that he would “make Azamgarh a mini Gujarat”.

Members of the minority community recall the slogans like “Poorvanchal main rahna hai to Yogi-Yogi kahna hai”, which did not go down well with them. Bina Para village pradhan Shahid and several clerics had been since then apprehensive of a communal flare-up. “So far, members of both the communities had maintained communal harmony, but Yogi had drawn a line in his speech and the Sunday clash was the fallout of his inflammatory speech,” said Shahid.

There was also a lack of foresightedness on the part of the police when they allowed Yogi’s cavalcade to pass through city areas dominated by the Muslim community. On his earlier visits to the city, he was allowed to reach the rally venue—DAV College—through another route. The district administration and the police find it hard to explain why Yogi was allowed to pass through the city despite intelligence reports of communal discord after the arrest of alleged Ahmedabad serial blasts mastermind Abu Bashir.

While Azamgarh District Magistrate Mayur Maheshwari said he was inquiring how Yogi was allowed to reach the venue though the city areas, SP Vijay Kumar Garg said, “The police gave him (Yogi) the permission to enter the city on the assurance that there will not be any problem. We are planning strict action against Yogi and his men.” The Government has since ordered a probe into the role of the administration and the police.

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