From encounter policy and bulldozer action to women’s safety and mafia crackdown, law and order has become the central governance plank of Uttar Pradesh — but will its perception hold till 2027?
In Uttar Pradesh, law and order is not just a subject of the Home Department; it is the core of political theatre, electoral messaging, and social churn. For a state that was once synonymous with words like ‘Jungle Raj’, ‘Bahubali’ and ‘Kattha’, the shift to a narrative of ‘Zero Tolerance against Crime’ has been the most significant political rebranding of the last decade. As the state moves towards the high-stakes Assembly Election of 2027, the question is no longer whether crime has reduced statistically, but whether the citizen — the woman returning from a coaching centre at 8 pm in Lucknow, the small trader in Kanpur, the Dalit family in Azamgarh, the farmer in Bundelkhand — feels safe, and who gets the credit for that safety.
The Zero Tolerance Narrative: From 2017 to 2027
The Yogi Adityanath model of policing, introduced in March 2017, fundamentally altered the grammar of law and order in Uttar Pradesh. It replaced the earlier approach of crime management with a language of crime deterrence through visible state force. The administration consciously projected three pillars: prompt criminal prosecution, property confiscation of mafia dons, and direct communication from the Chief Minister’s office to district police chiefs.
Between 2017 and 2024, the UP Police claims to have taken action under the Gangster Act against more than 77,000 accused and attached properties worth over Rs 4,500 crores belonging to identified mafia networks. This narrative acquired its mass appeal not through government press releases, but through images. The bulldozer became more than a machine; it became a metaphor for state intent. For the urban middle class of Noida, Ghaziabad, Prayagraj and Lucknow, it signaled decisiveness. For the rural poor, long intimidated by local land mafias, it signaled that the state could, for once, turn its strength against the strong, not just the weak.
However, by 2025, this model faces its own test of fatigue. When a strong action is repeated too many times, it risks being seen as routine rather than exceptional. The challenge for the incumbent government ahead of 2027 is to transition the narrative from ‘fear among criminals’ to ‘trust among citizens’.
NCRB Data vs Ground Reality: What the Numbers Actually Show
According to the National Crime Records Bureau data for 2022, the latest comprehensive release, Uttar Pradesh reported the highest number of crimes against women in absolute terms due to its large population, but showed a decline in per lakh population rate compared to 2016. Conviction rates in heinous crimes like murder and rape have improved from around 32 percent in 2016 to over 53 percent by 2023, as per UP Police’s own compilation of court outcomes. The number of dacoities fell by more than 80 percent compared to a decade ago, while cases of kidnapping for ransom have become almost negligible in western Uttar Pradesh.
Yet, crime data has serious limitations in a state like UP. The massive increase in FIR registration after 2017, driven by the directive that no police station can refuse to register an FIR, has artificially inflated total cognizable crimes. For example, the push for compulsory FIR registration under crimes against Scheduled Castes, women, and cyber fraud means more cases are recorded than ever before. Opposition parties argue that while serious organized crimes have come down, everyday crimes like theft, snatching, cyber fraud, and crimes related to land disputes remain high and underreported in perception surveys.
Furthermore, communal riot data shows sharp decline — from over 100 major communal incidents in 2016 to single digits after 2020. This has helped the state project communal calm, a key demand of investors for the UP Global Investors Summit and Defense Corridor. But the reduction in riots does not automatically translate into a sense of community harmony, especially when hate speech cases and localised social media tensions continue to trigger police flag marches.
Encounter Politics and Bulldozer Justice: Law, Symbolism and Legality
No discussion on UP’s law and order is complete without discussing encounters. According to official figures presented in the state legislature, from March 2017 to July 2024, UP Police was involved in more than 10,500 encounters, in which 207 criminals categorised as carrying rewards were killed and over 5,000 injured. The state government defends it as necessary use of force against hardened criminals who opened fire first, and as a signal that criminals cannot outgun the state.
Critics, including civil liberties groups, former police officers, and opposition parties like Samajwadi Party and Congress, question the disproportionate caste and community pattern in some districts. They cite data from independent researchers who claim that Muslims and certain OBC groups are overrepresented among those killed or booked under NSA and Gangster Act, compared to their share of overall heinous crime. The case of Vikas Dubey in 2020, the killing of Atiq Ahmed and Ashraf on camera while in police custody in 2023, and subsequent action against Mukhtar Ansari’s network have all become national debates on due process.
The bulldozer policy, formally using provisions under UP Urban Planning and Development Act, Municipal Corporation Act and the Gangster Act, has been challenged in courts. In November 2024, the Supreme Court of India issued guidelines prohibiting punitive demolition without due notice and judicial opportunity. Following that, UP administration recalibrated to issuing mandatory 15-day notices, videography of illegal encroachments, and linking demolition to proven illegal construction rather than merely criminal antecedent. This legal correction has reduced arbitrary demolitions but also removed a certain immediacy that was electorally potent.
The central question for 2027 is whether the voter endorses the method or only the result. If the result — lower mafia extortion, better night-time highway travel, reduced goonda tax for traders — holds, the method may be forgiven or even celebrated. If everyday extortion returns at the street level through lower constabulary, the image of the bulldozer will crack.
Regional Faultlines: Why Law and Order Means Different Things in Different UP
Uttar Pradesh is not one state when it comes to crime; it is four or five distinct criminological zones.
In Western UP or Paschimanchal — Meerut, Muzaffarnagar, Saharanpur, Shamli, Baghpat, Ghaziabad, Gautam Buddh Nagar — the historical issues have been communal clashes, sugarcane payment related violence, honour crimes, highway dacoity, and inter-state gangs from Haryana and Delhi. Post-2017, highway policing through PRV 112 vans has drastically reduced loot on NH-58 and NH-91. However, illegal arms manufacturing in Khurja and communal mobilisation around cattle and religious processions remain flashpoints. Jat versus Muslim equations, especially after the 2013 Muzaffarnagar riots, continue to inform police postings and voter perception of bias. In Purvanchal — Gorakhpur, Mau, Ghazipur, Ballia, Azamgarh, Jaunpur, Varanasi — the word mafia has had a specific social meaning: Brahmin, Thakur and Ansari networks controlling contracts, railway tenders, and mandis. The action against Mukhtar Ansari and his associates from Ghazipur and Mau has dismantled a four-decade-old network. Interviews with traders in Varanasi’s Dalmandi and Ghazipur’s grain market reveal that ‘rangdari’ collection has reduced, but new small local gangs of 4-5 youth with pistols have replaced the old mafia in sand mining and liquor contracts.
