Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav may have claimed that he would make UP free of crime if voted back to power, some recent acts by Samajwadi Party MLAs reflect poorly on the popular CM’s claim. Since 2012, the SP government has had a dubious record in controlling crime as well as communal incidents. And it continues even now, and that too by some SP MLAs. Consider these:

An SP MLA and minister of state in Akhilesh government, Radheshyam Singh, on Sunday threatened to burn alive a journalist in Kushinagar. While the journalist, Manoj Giri, has filed a police complaint in this regard, the minister’s threat reminds us of the cruel murder of journalist Jagendra Singh in 2015. Singh had exposed illegal sand mining by a UP minister through his Facebook page, Shahjahanpur Samachar.

On Monday, Samajwadi Party’s Sultanpur MLA Arun Kumar Verma was booked for the murder of a 22-year-old woman who had accused him of rape way back in 2013. But the SP government failed to take any action against him.

On Friday last, a 17-year-old boy was killed in Bijnor district. This murder was reportedly carried out to take revenge for an earlier incident of alleged killing of three Muslims in September on allegations of eve-teasing a girl. In Friday’s incident, most of the accused were relatives of those Muslims killed earlier. While the incident may polarise the ongoing elections, there have been several such incidents, including communal riots in western Uttar Pradesh. And Akhilesh government failed to stop such incidents.

Akhilesh has not been able to remove criminal elements not just from his own party, but his ministry also. A report in November by Association for Democratic Reforms(ADR) had said that 28 ministers out of 56 in the UP government had criminal cases pending against them.

Following alliance with the Congress, Akhilesh has promised to take the state further on the path of development. In the Common Minimum Programme (CMP), SP-Congress has promised to improve Uttar Pradesh police, law and order. But Akhilesh’s silence against his own MLAs reflects poorly on his tall claim. How can there be development in the state if Akhilesh can’t act against his own criminal MLAs?