Men in uniform leave UP government red-faced

Lucknow: Voted to power on promises of bringing Uttar Pradesh's crime graph under control, Akhilesh Yadav's Samajwadi Party (SP) government now has a new headache, the police.

Already reeling under a spate of criminal incidents, the police brass is battling the acts of shame by its own men.

In the last three months, police personnel have failed the force more than a dozen times.

Incidents such as a tipsy policeman firing and killing a 11-year-old in a marriage procession in Kanpur and two rape bids inside police stations -- one in Lucknow and the other in Budayin -- are of serious nature.

The other instances of misdemeanours include an inspector overturning a body with his boot in the presence of a senior officer, and the Saharanpur deputy inspector general telling a man to shoot his daughter for eloping or kill himself.

Six police officials were booked for the murder of a sub-inspector in Basti. One official was arrested in Lucknow for running a gang of vehicle thieves.

The National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) has also issued the state police a notice for remaining a spectator to the death of an old woman hit by a vehicle in Hapur district.

The Allahabad High Court's Lucknow bench too, taking notice of a tipsy sub-inspector in a police station trying to rape a woman, summoned the police chief.

Incidents show that in the last three months, rather than bringing the state to normalcy, police officials have embarrassed the government.

Officials admit that "misconduct" has brought a bad name to the force.

Inspector General of Police (Law and Order) Badri Prasad Singh, while admitting that such incidents have tainted the image of an otherwise hard-working force, said these were aberrations.

Singh added that in some cases the accused were immediately suspended.

Director General of Police Ambreesh Sharma, handpicked by Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav, has promised stringent action against the guilty.

In the rape attempt at a Lucknow police station, the sub-inspector was suspended the next day.

Opposition parties say such lawlessness in police is not new.

"The police seem to be out of control," said Vijay Bahadur Pathak, state spokesman of the Bharatiya Janata Party.

Close aides to the chief minister told IANS that Yadav was worried that the actions of policemen were sullying the image of the government that he had painstakingly tried to rebuild.

"The chief minister is obviously not happy with what is going on. I am sure he will take some serious action soon," said an aide.

Police faces the uphill task of bringing law and order on track.

With over 800 murders in the state in the last three months and several cases of kidnapping, rape, extortion and robberies, the going does not look too good for the SP government.