Opposition parties in Uttar Pradesh blamed the Akhilesh Yadav government for the 2013 Muzaffarnagar riots. (PTI file photo)
Opposition parties in Uttar Pradesh today blamed the Akhilesh Yadav government for the 2013 Muzaffarnagar riots that left 62 people dead after a judicial panel that went into it concluded intelligence failure and police laxity fuelled the conflagration.
BJP rejected the Justice Vishnu Sahai Commission report, which was tabled in the state Assembly today, as "incomplete" and demanded a CBI inquiry into the riots.
BJP legislature party leader Suresh Khanna said: "The inquiry report is a mix of several semi-truths. It is one-sided and does not highlight the real culprits, reasons, causes of provocation and how it spread."
"The SP government shifted the blame onto BJP and our seven senior leaders were detained without any reason. The real picture would have emerged if the commission had probed the incident thoroughly," he said in a statement.
The government failed to take prompt action and the intelligence system failed, he said, adding the situation got out of control due to "ministers' intervention".
Congress' Rita Bahuguna Joshi said, "The report is blaming the Centre that we didn't give intelligence (inputs). Our home minister at that time had again and again said we provided information. The UP government cannot run away from its responsibility."
BSP's Sudhindra Bhadoria said the riots are the most "unfortunate" incident after Independence. "The CM is responsible for this...Since it happened under Akhilesh Yadav," he said.
Senior SP leader Azam Khan, however, sought to put the blame at the media's door, saying it "over-exaggerated" the incident.
"In America, you can't show dead bodies and bloodshed," he said.