Around 300 communal incidents this year: UP and Karnataka on top

Close to 300 communal incidents took place in the country in the first five months of this year with Uttar Pradesh and Karnataka topping the list.

Across the country, 44 people were killed and another 892 suffered injuries in communal incidents. Among the 296 incidents reported this year till May, UP accounted for 60 of them while Karnataka registered 36. In UP, 16 people were killed and another 151 injured in such incidents while in Karnataka three people lost their lives and another 93 were wounded.

Other states were higher number of communal incidents reported this year were Madhya Pradesh (29), Rajasthan (27), West Bengal (26), Bihar (23) and Gujarat and Maharashtra (20 each), according to a written reply in Lok Sabha on Monday.

Last year saw 703 communal incidents, a decrease from 751 reported in the previous year. In 2014, there were 644 incidents. Altogether, there were 2,394 communal incidents between 2014 and May 2017 in which 322 were killed and 15,498 injured.

Almost all these years, UP and Karnataka had topped the list. Last year too UP (162) and Karnataka (101) were on the top while in 2015, these states had 155 and 105 incidents respectively. In 2015, Maharashtra also recorded the same number of incidents as that of Karnataka.

The year 2014 also saw UP, Gujarat and Maharashtra on top followed by Karnataka. While UP had then reported 133 incidents, Maharashtra had registered 97 and Gujarat 74 incidents. Karnataka accounted for 73 such incidents then.

The statistics also showed that the highest number of loss of life was in 2015 when 97 were killed. Last year, 86 lost their lives while in 2014, the number was 95. Among the injured, 2014 accounted for 1,921 while it was 2,264 in 2015 and 2,321 last year.