Representative image showing a police officer.
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Kanpur (UP): An FIR was lodged against Samajwadi Party MLA Amitabh Bajpai and over a hundred of his supporters for holding a protest at Fazalganj police station here, officials said on Thursday.
The protest was held on November 9 when Bajpai and his supporters reached the police station to allegedly put pressure on police for the release of a man, they said.
The development comes days ahead of the bypoll in the Sishamau assembly seat of Kanpur. Sishamau is among nine assembly seats where bypolls will be held on November 20.
According to a police official, on a complaint by Sub-inspector Deepak Tiwari, the FIR has been filed under the BNS sections 191(2) (rioting), 221 (voluntarily obstructs public servant in discharge of public functions), 223 (disobedience to an order lawfully promulgated by a public servant), and 352 (intentional insult).
An investigation has been launched into the matter, said the official.
In his complaint, Tiwari stated that he had made preventive arrest of Ashok Gupta (56), a resident of Fazalganj, under sections 170 (arrest to prevent commission of cognizable offences), 126 and 135 of Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita on November 8.
After getting information about Gupta's arrest, Bajpai, SP MLA from Arya Nagar in Kanpur, along with Varun Jaiswal alias Golu and dozens of his supporters reached Fazalganj police station and mounted pressure on police to release Gupta, the SI said in the complaint.
Bajpai later called his more supporters and party workers who left their vehicles before the police station gate resulting in chaos, he claimed.
The MLA, along with others, sat on dharna inside the police station with intent to mount pressure that triggered panic among the visitors, the police official added.