UP DGP OP Singh.

UP DGP OP Singh opens up on the criticism of his force over encounters. Speaking to Rohan Dua on policing a state like UP, Singh shares how he plans to tackle social media rumours and tap into Twitter to address concerns. Excerpts ...

You took charge at a time when the BJP government in UP had just begun to take on criminals. Encounters earned praises from UP CM Yogi Adityanath and deputy CM Keshav Prasad Maurya but drew sharp criticism from the Opposition and rights advocacy groups.

I would not like to comment on political criticism. However, I may say that encounters are not part of our state policy. We are custodians of law and professionally trained policemen. In our engagements against criminals in the past year, 423 policemen have been injured and four lost their lives. We arrested 3 lakh criminals while 98,000 have surrendered. As many as 62 hardened criminals got killed because they opened fire on police teams which had to retaliate to save their lives. Surrenders of such a large number of criminals and injury to such a large number of our policemen prove that our first option is to catch the criminals following due process of law and safeguard ourselves in case of being attacked.

Lynch mob and social media rumours are biggest concerns in India today. Centre has brought curbs on WhatsApp. UP saw many incidents including one in Hapur. Your plans?

We are adopting a community-based proactive approach to curb social media rumours. We have launched a digital volunteer scheme where we shall be roping in 250 digitally active citizens i n each police station to be our social media eyes and ears. Overall, 3.6 lakh volunteers will watch for potentially harmful text, images or videos being circulated and will alert us in time.

You bring with yourself rich experience of leading para forces. What do you think can help UP Police in times of riots and counter intelligence operations to combat ISIS reach or disasters?

I have worked in SPG and CRPF and headed NDRF and CISF. We are diligently playing our role as partners in the economic growth of UP. We are raising and expanding Special Police Operations Team (SPOT) within Anti-Terrorism Squad (ATS). Using integrated AI-enabled cameras and knowledge partnership with IIT Kanpur, BITS Pilani, and Isro for data analytics and predictive policing are some of our big reforms.

Ever since Centre moved triple talaq Bill and the Supreme Court called it unlawful, UP has seen an unprecedented surge of women who claim to be victims of this practice...

The Supreme Court judgment encouraged more women to speak out and approach formal channels of justice. In all cases where they have approached us, we have been taking action as per law.

UP Police has had more presence on Twitter than other police in India. How is it different from real face-to-face policing?

Twitter and face-to-face policing are not in watertight compartments. It is an important medium for us to receive public complaints and feedback. We have received 1.6 lakh actionable tweets, from which 1.5 lakh complaints have been resolved. In 1,707 cases, FIRs have been written on the basis of tweets, and 226 policemen have been suspended. As many as 50 FIRs were written against policemen on the basis of tweets and inquiry initiated against 473 personnel.

