Both the leaders were critical of the role of local police of Kanpur where a lab technician Sanjeet Yadav was kidnapped and later on his body was recovered after a month.

It was alleged by these leaders that a ransom of Rs 30 lakh was given to kidnappers in the presence of police. but even then they could not release him nor could the police recover money and it was after almost one month the body of Sanjeet Yadav was recovered.

When it was alleged that senior police officials mishandled, the state government suspended 11 police officers including IPS officer Aparna Gupta. SSP Kanpur was also transferred. Not satisfied with the state government measures, the family members of Sanjeet Yadav have demanded CBI probe into kidnapping and later killing of Sanjeet.

Similarly Priyanka Gandhi Vadra and Akhilesh Yadav took up the case of murder of Vikram Joshi of Ghaziabad who was shot at when he tried to protect her niece from eve- teasers It so happened that the niece of journalist Vikram Joshi was being regularly harassed by those eve teasers. No police action was taken when Joshi met them while the eve teasers got angry with Joshi for his complaint with the police..

They tried to teach Vikram Joshi a lesson for approaching police and fired at him who later on succumbed to injuries in the hospital. The death of Joshi created stir among the journalist community and both Priyanka and Akhilesh took up the issue with the state government in an aggressive manner. UP chief minister was forced to announce Rs. 10 lakh compensation for the family of Joshi, job to widow and free education to the victim’s children.

Another case in limelight was of kidnapping of class V student Balram who was grandson of a businessman and owner of Rajesh Beedi in Gonda. The kidnappers had demanded huge sum of Rs 4 crore. This issue was also raised by Priyanka and Akhilesh through letters to the CM and a number of tweets.

State police and STF launched the operation. The case was cracked and young Balram was rescued. Significantly, a lady was arrested with kidnappers.

Priyanka Gandhi has also raised the issue of Ghaziabad businessman Vikram Tiyagi who is missing for more than a month. After her party delegations, Priyanka Gandhi Vadra herself met the family members and wrote letter to CM Yogi Adityanath seeking his intervention and direction to police to locate him at the earliest.

There are many cases in Uttar Pradesh where the land mafia occupy land of people at will and the local administrations keep mum if they are politically connected. Many of this mafia gang have got connections with the ruling party and the police. Even senior officials of the state government have been the victims of the operations of the land ma

Senior PCS officer Prawarsheel Baranwal, ADM Ballia was finding it difficult to protect land in Mirjapur from land mafia for lack of cooperation from local police. The issue was taken to PCS Association President Dr Indramani. There has been no action against land mafia. In a similar case, another officer also failed to protect his land.

Though both the leaders are seriously taking up the issues of law and order in the state, there is no indication of any joint movement of the Congress and the SP at political level against the BJP led government .The divisions in the opposition ranks in the state, has been helping the state government in not taking much care of the urgent people’s issues. (IPA Service)