Samajwadi Party president Akhilesh Yadav was on Thursday detained by the police here when he was on his way to Auraiya to attend a protest rally.
Yadav, who was later released and allowed to go to Lucknow, attacked the Yogi Adityanath government in the state alleging that it was misusing state machinery.
The former chief minister was stopped near an under-construction toll plaza in the Hasanganj police station area on the Lucknow-Agra expressway and taken to the agriculture research centre in Dhaurhara from where he was allowed to return to Lucknow, Circle Officer (CO) Dhirendra Kumar Singh said.
Speaking to newspersons, Akhilesh attacked the Bharatiya Janata Party government in Uttar Pradesh.
"I was going to Auriaya to meet my party workers who were subjected to barbaric police action...The state government wants to win the zila panchayat post by misusing official machinery...My workers did not do anything wrong in Auraiya," he said.
This dictatorial attitude with the help of police will not be tolerated, Yadav said.
"The BJP is only doing politics over cow," he claimed.
On a question about the tragic death of several children in a state-run hospital in Gorakhpur, he said it was a result of the government's failure.
On Wednesday, the police had detained some senior SP leaders after workers allegedly turned violent at not being allowed to accompany their candidate for the zila panchayat chairperson's post to the nomination room in the Auraiya collectorate.
