Urdu poet Munawwar Rana’s daughter Sumaiyya Rana was placed under house arrest on Wednesday in Lucknow, Uttar Pradesh, over her call for an anti-government protest, the police said.
Sumaiyya, who had led the protests against the Citizenship (Amendment) (CAA) Act, 2019, in Lucknow earlier this year, had urged the public to beat ‘thalis’ (plates) outside Uttar Pradesh (UP) chief minister Yogi Adityanath’s official residence on Tuesday.
She had exhorted the public to raise their voices against a host of issues, including the UP government’s mishandling of the raging coronavirus disease (Covid-19) pandemic.
“The UP government has failed in containing the contagion in the state. Private hospitals are fleecing the public because the state government is turning a blind eye on them. The Covid-19-related high mortality rate has further worsened the healthcare crisis in UP. Besides, the state government has also failed in curbing unemployment that has started taking a toll on the state’s youths. I had given a call to make our voices heard,” said Sumaiyya, who lives at Qaiserbagh in Lucknow.
However, the police didn’t allow the protesters to gather outside the CM’s residence.
{{/usCountry}}However, the police didn’t allow the protesters to gather outside the CM’s residence.
{{/usCountry}}“The district administration and the police didn’t allow us to assemble outside the CM’s residence on Tuesday. On Wednesday, they put me under house arrest,” Rana said.
She said she saw heavy deployment of police personnel outside her residence and later she was told to stay indoors for another couple of days. She said she had also called a press conference to highlight the apathy of the UP government and how it was trying to muzzle the public’s “voices”.
Another anti-CAA activist Uzma Parveen was also put under house arrest.
Naveen Arora, joint commissioner of police (law and order), Lucknow Police, said, “A two-day restriction has been imposed on Sumaiyya Rana as a precautionary measure in order to maintain law and order.”