When it comes to crime, India’s largest state UP has the highest incidence of firearm fatalities. Adding insult to injury, a report says that the state also has the highest number of cities nationwide where this occurs. “Most cities (Allahabad, Agra, Kanpur, Meerut and Varanasi) in UP had a high percentage of firearm fatalities due to accidents and a very low percentage of firearm fatalities due to murders,” says a report released on Tuesday.

The report undescored gun deaths in Meerut and some other cities in UP. “Meerut was the extreme case, with just 2.6 percent of the total firearm deaths in the city reportedly due to murder by firearm, and 92 percent reportedly due to accidental causes,” said the report prepared by Small Arms Survey, Switzerland-based international thinktank.

The report analysed data up to 2008 from the national crime records bureau (NCRB) and studied armed violence assessment in the country.
Meerut ignominously is on top of the list of Indian cities with high murder rates. According to the study, “Meerut has a high murder rate – 4.6 per 100,000 – compared with the average megacity murder rate of 2.7 per 100,000 and the national average murder rate of 2.8.”

Mayawati’s state also figured in the category of highest incidence of murder cases among all states in 2008. The year before, the dalit CM came to power in the state winning the assembly elections. The report said, “4,564 cases of murder from all causes accounted for almost 14 percent of total cases in the country. This one state represented just under 36 percent of the victims murdered with firearms nationally.”

The report also mentioned that Bihar, Jharkhand and Uttar Pradesh accounted for 62.4 percent of all victims reportedly murdered by firearms in 2008. “Murders by gunfire in India totaled 4,101 in 2008, or 12.2 percent of all 33,727 murders in 2008,” the report held.

The report said India has 40 million (4 crore) civilian owned firearms out of which only 15 percent are licensed. “Victims murdered by unlicensed firearms constituted to 86 percent in 2008. The magnitude of the problem posed by unlicensed firearms remains alarming,” it said.

As the state goes on polls next year, the report will definitely not please the CM, as she has been consistently attacked by the opposition parties in run up to the assembly elections over the law and order problems in the state.

1. Read the India Armed Violence Assessment (IAVA) Issue Brief 1:  India's States of Armed Violence: Assessing the Human Cost and Political Priorities

2. Read the IAVA Issue Brief 2:  Mapping Murder: The Geography of Indian Firearm Fatalities