Top UP officials to tour districts, gather feedback on law and order

LUCKNOW: The state government has decided that its top bureaucrats and police officials, including the chief secretary, the principal secretary (home) and the director general of police (DGP), would undertake ‘reality check’ tours across Uttar Pradesh.

The move comes a couple of months before chief minister Akhilesh Yadav sets out on his ‘Samajwadi Rath Yatra’ in September.

The three officials would visit the districts separately to gather feedback about people’s perception on the law and order situation and the local police.

The officials, including the new chief secretary Deepak Singhal, would arrive in the districts at short notice. They would also visit police stations and conduct an on-the-spot performance review of the officials from the level of police station in-charges to superintendents of police. Those who don’t measure up would be made to “face the music,” an officer in the DGP office said.

The DGP office has circulated a message among police officials across the district and told them that the information (about surprise checks) was also intended as a warning.

Senior government officials said that the CM had made it clear that he wouldn’t tolerate police laxity at the local level to tarnish his government’s image. The chief minister had earlier got bureaucrats to visit villages to improve his government’s connectivity with the rural masses.

“The officials would leave at short notice so that officials in the district hardly get any time to react. There are orders from the top to improve the law and order situation. With elections around, any laxity on the law and order front won’t be tolerated,” a police official said. The move comes even as BJP cadre have been holding sit-ins outside police stations in the state to target the Samajwadi Party government’s performance on the law and order situation.

The main opposition party – the BSP – too has been playing up the ‘rising crime graph’ under the SP rule.