Rahul Gandhi leaves for Hathras, to meet kin of stampede victims

LUCKNOW: Leader of Opposition in the Lok Sabha Rahul Gandhi left for Uttar Pradesh’s Hathras from Delhi early Friday morning, according to Congress leaders.

Apart from Uttar Pradesh Congress chief Ajai Rai, state Congress in-charge Avinash Pande, party spokesperson Supriya Shrinate and other office bearers are accompanying Gandhi to Hathras.

Rai had on Thursday told PTI that Gandhi will meet the family members of the victims of the Hathras stampede tragedy, which claimed the lives of 121 people at a religious gathering.

He had blamed the Uttar Pradesh government for the incident. “The incident of Hathras is a failure of the UP government. Yesterday, Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath visited Hathras and later Deputy Chief Minister Brajesh Pathak also went there. But they did not go together; this shows the infighting,” Rai said while addressing the media at the UPCC headquarters here.

He had also reiterated the demand of the Congress for compensation of Rs 1 crore to the families of those who were killed in the stampede and Rs 25 lakh to the injured.

“We also want a judicial inquiry into the incident to be conducted by a sitting judge of the high court, not a retired judge,” Rai added.

The Uttar Pradesh government on Wednesday formed a three-member judicial commission headed by a retired High Court judge to probe the Hathras tragedy, looking also into the possibility that a conspiracy was behind the stampede.