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Updated: Oct 11, 2019 02:36 IST

Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) chief Mayawati on Thursday cited “public resentment” over the “fake encounter” of a 28-year-old sand miner in Jhansi and slammed Uttar Pradesh’s Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) government over the law and order situation in the state.

The UP police last week called Pushpendra Yadav an “illegal sand miner” and said he was killed when he fired at a police team. But his family has alleged that he was killed in a staged gunfight after he refused to pay a bribe to a police station in-charge.

“...There is a lot of public resentment and uneasiness among the public pertaining to the fake encounter. Voices are raised against it. It is clear that there is no law and order in Uttar Pradesh. The region is dominated by jungle raj of criminals,” she tweeted.

Samajwadi Party chief Akhilesh Yadav, who visited Jhansi on Wednesday and met Pushpendra Yadav’s family members and demanded magisterial inquiry in the case, too, slammed the state government.

“There are many loopholes in the police story,” said Akhilesh Yadav. He added that he has “no trust” in the police and the administration. “Which Ram Raj is going on in Uttar Pradesh? This is not Ram Raj but Nathuram Raj. With mob lynching, police lynching have also started in the state,” he said.

He added that the truth of Pushpendra Yadav killing is known “but the state government continues to shield the murderers.”

Akhilesh Yadav cited the arrest of a law student, who has accused former Union minister Chinmayanand of rape, on extortion charges and said there is “jungle rule in Uttar Pradesh”.

BJP leader Siddharth Nath Singh defended the Uttar Pradesh police and said Akhilesh Yadav went to Pushpendra Yadav’s house because “he is in love with the sand mining mafia and has to take care of the caste equation”. He added the former chief minister does not care how the sand mining mafia should be eradicated. “This is precisely why he was thrown out by people in the elections.”