Lucknow: Violence spread to more parts of Uttar Pradesh as anti-citizenship law protesters pelted stones at police in Firozabad, Gorakhpur, Bhadohi, Bahraich and Sambhal when they were stopped from taking out rallies after the Friday prayers.
Prohibitory orders under CrPC section 144 have been placed in the entire state since Nov 9.
Though the state capital Lucknow and Aligarh remained largely peaceful, new areas were hit by violence. Demonstrators indulged in stone-pelting in several cities, forcing police to use canes and lob tear-gas shells to disperse the protesters.
Lucknow, Gorakhpur and Sambhal were hit majorly by the ongoing protests on Thursday too.
Internet services remained suspended in several districts to check spread of rumours.
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More than four years remain of the second term. Once the dust settles from all that is happening around us, if there is serious intent to regain the initiative and to not allow the sense of drift, later crisis, to grow, one of the early corrective steps would be to give Uttar Pradesh a fine Chief Minister, someone with a development vision. The earlier choice was surprising, a gamble that has not paid off. The gradient is steepening. The earlier complacent view that any lamppost can be installed anywhere and it will dispel darkness is now an unaffordable luxury.