Ms Anju Bala is Member of Parliament from Misrikh, one of the 80 Lok Sabha constituencies in the state of Uttar Pradesh. Five assembly segments are covered by Misrikh Parliamentary constitutency. She spoke to Editor Sayantan Chakravarty 

What is your assessment about your party in the UP elections that will be held next year?

I have no doubt that the lotus will bloom in Uttar Pradesh, the largest single state in any country in the world. People are fed up with corruption, nepotism, and high-handedness. The rule of law has been completely abandoned. 

You were injured in a rally recently. What exactly happened?

In August, we were trying to move towards the Vidhan Sabha in Lucknow when the police force was unleashed upon us. We were protesting the rapidly deteriorating law and order in the state when the uniformed men swooped down on us. I was struck on the head, I still don’t know with what, and I remained unconscious for well over an hour. My family broke into a sweat. Even after I regained consciousness, I wasn’t fully stable, there were lots of scans and tests that were done. Had I been struck somewhere else, it may have been worse. Some of my co-workers had close to 20 stitches. This is how people who want to demonstrate peacefully are dealt with. But there is a history of unleashing violence associated with the current rulers in the UP Government, we are very much aware of it. Gutter was used for cannoning us. You cannot stoop lower than that. We found it difficult to breathe when tear-gassed. My family is in Jammu. They were very worried, in fact some people started spreading rumours that I had passed away. When my mother heard my voice eventually, she was crying because she thought it was my younger sister speaking. It was only when my sister put the speaker phone on and said “speak to didi” that she was convinced that I had survived. All five of us sisters have grown up in a protected environment in Jammu, so me getting lathi-charged and being injured badly was a difficult thing for my parents to accept.