BJP will take criminals to "grab power": Yechury on Kanda's support to saffron party

CPI(M) general secretary Sitaram Yechury hit out at the ruling BJP on Friday for taking the help of rape accused MLA Gopal Kanda to form the government in Haryana, saying the saffron party only wanted to "grab power".

A former airhostess, who was employed with Kanda's company, committed suicide in 2012, accusing him of harassment.

The police, during its investigation, accused the MLA of raping the woman and also charged him with abetment to suicide. The mother of the woman also ended her life subsequently and Kanda was booked for abetting her suicide too.

The matter is in court now.

Kanda, representing the Haryana Lokhit Party, has offered his support to the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in a hung Assembly in Haryana.

"They (BJP) will go with criminals, with those who have cases registered against them over very serious offences. Even such people will be taken by them to somehow grab power. They only want to grab power and utilise the spoils of office to help their own cronies," Yechury told reporters here.

In a statement, the Communist Party of India (Marxist) also said the results of the Maharashtra and Haryana Assembly elections and bypolls in a number of states showed that the impact of the communal, nationalist, jingoistic, emotional propaganda fanned by the BJP was "waning".

"Both the Prime Minister and the Home Minister aggressively mounted a Hindutva nationalist campaign. In Maharashtra, the BJP-Shiv Sena returned to government with a reduced majority. In Haryana, the BJP failed to win a majority.

"Having lost the government, the BJP will resort to its usual sordid horse-trading. The opposition will have to get its act together to prevent such hijacking of people's mandate," the Left party said in the statement.

The Haryana Assembly polls threw up a hung verdict on Thursday, with the BJP emerging as the single-largest party with 40 seats, but falling six short of the majority mark of 46 in the 90-member House.