GUNDA RAJ TO GLOBAL GATEWAY: CM YOGI IS TRANSFORMING U.P.

The story of UP in the last 7-8 years is not a slogan but a lived reality of a state that went from 'BIMARU' to 'BEMISAAL', from 'Jungle Raj' to 'Janta ka Raj'.

- SHEHZAD POONAWALLA NEW DELHI

Eight years ago, a midnight drive from Lucknow to Kanpur was a gamble with death.

Toll plazas were extorted by local bahubalis; police stations doubled as safe houses for the same men who looted the highways. In 2016, Uttar Pradesh recorded 4,94,179 cognisable offences-more than 57 every hour. Communal Riots erupted 67 times that year; women in western UP locked their doors by 6 p.m. The state's per capita income languished at Rs 46,000, lower than Bihar's in real terms. Investors joked that the only "ease of doing business" was the ease with which a factory could be shut down by a phone call from mafias. Today, the same stretch of road is lit by solar lamps, patrolled by women constables and flanked by upcoming industries.

Criminal Mukhtar Ansari once ran eastern UP from a jail cell in Banda. His writ extended to coal mines, railway contracts and even the price of fish in Ghazipur mandi. Atiq Ahmed controlled Prayagraj the way a feudal lord did-complete with private armies and public fear. Between 2017 and 2025, the Yogi government neutralised 222 gangsters in encounters, injured 8,118 and attached properties worth Rs 1,420 crore. Conviction rates in heinous crimes rose from mere 9.8% to 68.4%. The message under CM Yogi is clear: the state would no longer subcontract law and order to gundas. When law and order of any state drastically improves, it naturally has an impact on its economic, investment prospects and development.

By 2024-25, nominal GSDP of UP has touched a whopping Rs 29.78 lakh crore from Rs 13.3 lakh crore, with real growth averaging 11.6%, outpacing the national 8.2%. Per capita income now stands at Rs 93,500 and is projected to cross Rs 1.24 lakh by the end of 2025. Foreign direct investment, a measly Rs 3,300 crore in the five years before 2017 surged to Rs 14,808 crore in the next few years.