NEW DELHI: Uttar Pradesh led a nationwide decline in communal violence until October this year, with incidents in the state down by nearly half and deaths at one-third of the number recorded in 2013. The sharp drop in numbers though can partly be explained by the Muzaffarnagar riots last year which caused more than usual deaths and injuries.UP, which as per data presented in the Lok Sabha on Tuesday recorded the highest incidence of communal violence since 2012, witnessed 129 incidents (down from 247 in entire 2013) and 25 deaths (from 77) until October this year. However, the number of those injured due to rioting in the state was 364, still higher than the 360 injured reported in 2013.Ranking behind UP in terms of communal occurrences until October were states like Maharashtra (82 incidents), Karnataka (68), Rajasthan (61), Gujarat (59), Bihar (51) and Madhya Pradesh (42).Delhi, which had registered insignificant levels of communal violence since 2011, witnessed a spike this year with seven incidents, which caused one death and left 101 injured. This is big when compared to the figures of four, three and two incidents that were reported in 2011, 2012 and 2013 respectively. Fatalities in Delhi were nil over the last three years and injuries at 8, 28 and 1 in 2011, 2012 and 2013 respectively.While there was no major difference in incidents of communal violence reported from Maharashtra, Rajasthan, Karnataka and Gujarat as compared to the recent past, Madhya Pradesh, which has traditionally been a close third after Maharashtra in number of flare-ups, showed significant improvement with incidents and non-fatal casualties down by a half as compared to 2013. Kerala too witnessed somewhat of a turnaround, with communal incidents in the southern state down at just three and the injured at 13 from 41 and 65, respectively, in the whole of 2013.Though communal incidents and deaths were around the same levels in Maharashtra, Karnataka and Rajasthan, the number of injured fell significantly to 165, 151 and 116 till October 2014 from 352, 235 and 194 respectively last year.Nationally, incidents were down from 823 in 2013 to 561 until October this year, while the number of those killed and injured in rioting fell to 90 and 1,688 from 133 and 2,269 last year.Minister of state for home Kiren Rijiju, while placing this data as part of his reply to a Lok Sabha question, attributed communal outbreaks to "religious factors, gender-related disputes, alleged blasphemous portrayal of religion/religious symbols on social media/mobile applications, disputes over land belonging to religious sites and other issues".