Two arrested for dumping potatoes outside UP CM's residence

Lucknow: Coming down heavily on Lucknow's Senior Superintendent of Police Deepak Kumar, Samajwadi Party president Akhilesh Yadav on Saturday said that he must not go down to such a level. He said that amid the law and order crises, police is busy dealing with potatoes.

"He should be felicitated with Yash Bharti for his potato thieves hunt," said Akhilesh.

Two Samajwadi Party activists were arrested for allegedly dumping potatoes in high-security areas, including outside Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath's residence and the Vidhan Sabha building here, police said on Saturday.

Lucknow's Senior Superintendent of Police Deepak Kumar said the arrested persons -- Ankit Singh Chauhan and Sushil Pasi -- were linked to the Samajwadi Party's youth wing.

He said after the potato dumping incident on January 6, over 10,000 telephone numbers were on surveillance that led the police to zero in on the two.

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Deepak Kumar said a CCTV footage revealed that the potatoes were wheeled into the high-security zone in a vehicle owned by Sanju Katiyar, who is the husband of Kannauj district panchayat chairperson Shilpi Chauhan.

Kannauj is the parliamentary constituency of Dimple Yadav, wife of former Chief Minister and Samajwadi Party chief Akhilesh Yadav.

The police officer said potatoes was purchased from a cold storage and that the culprits had stayed at a house in Mall Avenue a day before the incident.