UP on high alert for Friday prayers, internet suspended in 21 districts

In view of the deaths of at least 19 people in anti-Citizenship (Amendment) Act protests, the Uttar Pradesh government has issued a high alert across the state and disconnected internet services in 21 districts, including 9 sensitive districts till the evening of December 27, to prevent any untoward incidents during the Friday prayers.

While internet lines have been snapped in the western districts of Bulandshahar, Bijnor, Muzaffarnagar, Agra, Firozabad, Sambhal, Aligarh and Ghaziabad, mobile internet services and SMS of all mobile services except BSNL will remain suspended in Lucknow on Friday.

Security was mounted and patrolling intensified in sensitive areas across Uttar Pradesh to ensure peace during Friday prayers. Paramilitary force personnel and state police force have been deployed, and drone cameras are being used to ensure security on Friday, Gorakhpur District Magistrate Vijyendra Pandiyan said.

The police have already issued an alert in 15 violence-hit districts for Friday and the government may consider extending the internet blackout to Kanpur, Meerut, Rampur, Bareilly, Moradabad, Aligarh, Muzaffarnagar, Hapur and Azamgarh, depending on the severity of the situation, reports said.

In a fresh release, the Uttar Pradesh government also announced that it has identified 498 people in connection with the damage caused to public property during the recent protests in Lucknow, Meerut, Sambhal, Rampur, Muzaffarnagar, Ferozabad, Kanpur, Mau and Bulandshahar.

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Commenting on the situation, OP Singh, UP DGP, said, “Law & order situation is absolutely under control, we continue to have strategic deployment of forces, Special Investigation Teams formed to investigate cases. We have suspended internet services in 21 districts,they will be restored as and when situation demands.”

OP Singh, UP DGP: We are not touching innocents and we will not spare people who were involved in it (violence). And that is the reason we have arrested active members of many organisations, whether it is PFI or any other political parties. #CAAProtests https://t.co/puFTLUNPhE

— ANI UP (@ANINewsUP) December 27, 2019

Inspector general (IG) of police, Law and Order, Praveen Kumar told media that district police chiefs have been asked to conduct peace committee meetings with Muslim clerics and other religious and local leaders to prevent any violence in their respective areas.

DGP OP Singh has asked officers in all districts to stage flag marches in sensitive areas. ADG (Law and Order) PV Ramashastry told Indian Express that district SPs have been asked to use drones to identify houses with terraces where brick and stones have been stored. At least 50 such houses have been identified in Firozabad and notices served to owners to remove them immediately.

The police also conducted peace committee meetings in several localities of Lucknow on Thursday.

“We interacted with people, mainly Muslims, to explain that CAA is not meant to nullify anyone’s citizenship but it is to allow citizenship to minorities from neighbouring countries namely Pakistan, Afghanistan and Bangladesh,” circle officer of Gomti Nagar Santosh Kumar Singh told Hindustan Times. He said pamphlets containing seven points about the CAA were also distributed among people.

Additional Director General of police Prashant Kumar on Thursday said that 317 people have been arrested and 79 cases lodged in connection with protests against CAA in Meerut alone.

The state police has so far arrested 1,113 people in 327 cases and placed another 5,558 under preventive detention, making it the biggest crackdown in the state since the 2013 Muzaffarnagar riots which claimed 63 lives.

The police said 327 FIRs were registered across the state, 288 policemen were injured in the clashes. The cases include charges of arson, vandalism, attempt to murder, rioting, attack on police force and violation of Section 144 of CrPC.

Among those arrested in Lucknow include social activist and Congress worker Sadaf Jafar, retired IPS officer SR Darapuri, lawyer Mohammad Shueb and theatre artist Deepak Kabir.

Police said special investigation teams, headed by officials of the rank of additional superintendent of police, have been formed in all the affected districts to investigate the cases.

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The northern state witnessed widespread violence between December 19 and 21, leading to the death of 19 protesters. The toll rose to 19, after two men injured in the protests, succumbed in Delhi hospitals on Thursday.

Police say four deaths were reported from Meerut and Kanpur each, three were reported from Fizorabad, two each from Bijnor, Sambhal and Muzaffarnagar and one each from Rampur and Lucknow, asserting that none of them were due to police firing.