The Uttar Pradesh government said it seized property worth around ₹733 crore from alleged mafia elements and criminals involved in gangster activities in 2020.
The properties of listed mafia criminals and their associates in gangster cases were attached under Section 14 of The Uttar Pradesh Gangsters and Anti-Social Activities (Prevention) Act, 1986, according to the State Home Department.
A special drive was run against mafia and criminals involved in gangster activities to break their spine, said Additional Chief Secretary Home Awanish Awasthi.
Of the ₹733 crore, most property was attached in Lucknow (₹88.15 crore), Gautam Buddha Nagar (₹66.80 crore), Balrampur (₹58.80 crore), Ghazipur (₹42.09 crore), Gorakhpur (₹38.20 crore), Auraiya (₹31.22 crore), Jaunpur (₹29.40 crore), Muzaffarnagar (₹28.83 crore), Prayagraj (₹26.17 crore) and Deoria (₹24.39 crore) districts, the government said.
The U.P. Gangsters Act defines a gangster as a member or leader or organiser of a gang and includes any person who abets or assists in the activities of a gang.
According to the Act, a gang is a group of persons who act either individually or collectively by violence or threat or show of violence or intimidation or coercion with the object of disturbing order or gaining any undue temporal, pecuniary, material or other advantage for himself or any other person.
Section 14 of the Act empowers the District Magistrate (DM) to attach properties of alleged gangsters.
If the DM has reason to believe that any property, whether moveable or immovable, in possession of any person has been acquired by a gangster as a result of a commission of an offence triable under this Act, he may order attachment of such property whether or not cognizance of such offence has been taken by any court, the act says.
