The Uttar Pradesh Police on Thursday claimed that since 2017 more than 30,000 alleged criminals have been arrested and 238 killed in over 14,900 gunfights, The Hindu reported.

“Over the past eight years, 14,973 operations have been carried out, resulting in the arrest of 30,694 criminals,” the newspaper quoted Director General of Police Rajeev Krishna as saying. “Of these, 9,467 who attacked the police were shot in the leg, while 238 were killed in encounters.”

Krishna said that the police had implemented an “aggressive crackdown on crime” under the directions of Chief Minister Adityanath. The state had achieved the best “law enforcement record in the country” under the chief minister, he added.

The police officer also said that the Bharatiya Janata Party leader, who became the chief minister in 2017, had made it clear that “criminals have no place” in Uttar Pradesh and that they “must either give up crime or leave the state”.

The highest number of gunfights had taken place in western Uttar Pradesh’s Meerut zone, where 7,969 alleged criminals were arrested and 2,911 injured, Krishna said.

In the Agra zone, 5,529 alleged criminals were arrested, of whom 741 were injured, he said.

“In the Bareilly zone, 4,383 criminals were caught, of whom 921 were injured,” The Hindu quoted him as saying.

Krishna also said that the majority of such operations included targeting gangsters running groups involved in extortion, land grabbing and contract killings, The Indian Express reported.

Commenting on the data released by the police, the Opposition Congress claimed that several of the gunfights were “fake”, The Hindu reported.

“The police must also put out figures about the caste and other social details of the individuals targeted in these encounters,” Congress leader Shahnawaz Alam said. “We believe that people from social segments seen to be against the present regime face the brunt of police action.”

Alam said that the National Human Rights Commission should take cognisance of the report and seek more details.

Extrajudicial executions have risen since the BJP government came to power in Uttar Pradesh in 2017.

Official records say that there were nearly 8,500 of these encounters from March 2017, when Adityanath came to power, to August 2021. Nearly 150 persons were killed in encounters during this period.