Vikas Dubey’s encounter killing has led to a number of Twitter hashtags (started mainly by the Opposition) claiming that Vikas, be it the gangster or development, cannot survive under the BJP government. Samajwadi Party (SP) chief Akhilesh Yadav too spoke to The Daily Guardian about how UP is fast developing into an “encounter raaj” state. Akhilesh claimed that policemen are actually being promoted or given plum posts on the basis of the number of encounters they do. According to police reports, there have been around 1,500 encounter deaths, ever since the Yogi government took office in 2017. Priyanka Gandhi Vadra, Congress general secretary, has accused Yogi of turning “Uttar Pradesh into Apradh Pradesh”. She added that “criminals like Vikas Dubey are being shielded by people in power”. Her colleague from the state, Jitin Prasada too rather dramatically raised questions about “a khoon ka badla khoon” (repaying murder with murder) brand of politics.
There is little to indicate that CM Yogi Adityanath is in any way chastened by any of this, or any of the numerous NHRC notices or PILs that come his way. Very early in his tenure when questioned about rising encounter deaths, the UP CM had told the media that “agar voh bandook chalaayenge toh hum chudiya nahin pehante” (if they will fire bullets then my men don’t wear bangles). Don’t forget that one of Dubey’s crimes was that he had killed eight policemen in an ambush.
If Yogi is trying to prove a point on law and order, he is certainly going about it in a rather anachronistic way. However, deteriorating law and order in Uttar Pradesh was one of reasons why Akhilesh Yadav was voted out of office. Or, does this reflect a larger mindset that is fed up with our ponderous judicial system? Fresh in everyone’s minds is the encounter deaths of the four rapists who had raped and murdered a young Hyderabad veterinarian last year. At that time too the debate between Article 21 and those thirsting for instant justice of the vigilante kind had done the rounds. The same is being repeated today, though arguably it is easier to speak up for the hapless Hyderabad girl than it is for a dreaded gangster.
There is also the subtext of caste here which is prevalent in almost all conversations in the cow belt. Dubey was a Brahmin, and there are those who are asking whether he would have been gunned down had he been a Thakur for the Yogi government has been accused of promoting “Thakurwaad”. The Kuldip Senger case comes to mind, for it was only after a reprimand from the party bosses in Delhi that the Yogi government took action against the party’s four-time (Rajput) MLA who was accused of raping a minor in the Unnao rape case (2017).
But those asking for Yogi’s resignation will get no further than the semantics. Neither Yogi nor his party seniors seem to be much worried about the bad press they get out of this encounter killing, as at some level it also underlines the image of a hardline state that takes swift action against a dreaded gangster. This is exactly the kind of 56-inch chest-beating drumbeat that the BJP wants to send out, and the UP CM knows this only too well.