Gangtok: Dushyant Kumar Gautam was sworn in as Sikkim's 19th governor on Monday, succeeding Om Prakash Mathur, and the Congress lost no time in saying its protest against the appointment will only get louder.
The party's Uttarakhand in-charge Kumari Selja called the choice shameful. "It is shameful that a person whose name is linked to a massive scandal is being appointed to Raj Bhavan," she said. "Every citizen in Uttarakhand feels that there is no justice in the state. The murder of the young woman in the hill state in 2022 had shaken the country, but justice has not been meted out to this day."
Selja said the Congress will take out yatras across Uttarakhand and gherao the state assembly on October 27.
Gautam's oath marks a change at the top of Sikkim's Raj Bhavan. Sikkim is a small Himalayan state whose capital is Gangtok. The Congress has tied the new governor to a 2022 murder case in Uttarakhand, a charge it has raised ever since his name surfaced for the post. The party said its state unit would keep the issue alive through the yatras.
The BJP has not responded to the Congress's latest remarks. Selja said the protest will be "peaceful but persistent", adding that workers across the hill state were being readied for the assembly gherao.
The Congress's central demand is justice for the family in the 2022 case. The party argues the issue is not limited to Uttarakhand but is tied to public faith in the justice system. According to Selja, the yatras will carry the message to people across the state, with the assembly gherao as the centrepiece of the campaign. Governors in Sikkim are appointed by the Central government.
The yatras are expected to begin within days, with the October 27 gherao billed as the campaign's first big step.