Republic Day honours: UP Police bag 90 medals for gallantry and service

LUCKNOW: Uttar Pradesh Police has brought national recognition to the state by winning a total of 90 police medals, including 18 President’s Medals for Gallantry, four President’s Medals for Distinguished Service, and 68 Medals for Meritorious Service. The awards were announced on the eve of Republic Day 2026.Senior police officials said the honours reflect the force’s sustained crackdown on organised crime, successful high-risk encounters, and exemplary policing across the state. One of the major gallantry citations relates to the Achalganj encounter in Unnao, where a Special Task Force (STF) team neutralised history-sheeter Anuj Pratap in September 2024. Anuj was the prime accused in a ₹1.5 crore jewellery shop robbery-cum-murder in Sultanpur, in which the shop owner was killed after resisting the robbery.For displaying exceptional courage, STF Inspector Santosh Kumar, Sub-Inspector Saurabh Mishra, and Head Constable Kavindra were awarded the President’s Medal for Gallantry.Another gallantry honour went to the UP STF Varanasi unit for a daring operation in which Manish Singh alias Sonu, a notorious criminal carrying a ₹2 lakh reward, was killed in an encounter on March 22, 2022, in the Lohata area of Varanasi. The gallantry medals were awarded to Additional SP Vinod Kumar Singh, Inspector Amit Srivastava, Head Constable Baijnath Ram, and Head Constable Manoj Kumar Singh.In the Saharanpur encounter of March 16, 2020, four police personnel were honoured for confronting an armed criminal who was planning a major offence. Despite heavy firing that injured officers and damaged bulletproof jackets, the police team eliminated Abad, a dreaded criminal carrying a ₹50,000 reward. The gallantry medals were awarded to then Deputy SP Rajanish Kumar Upadhyay, Sub-Inspector Jarrar Hussain, Sub-Inspector Sunil Singh, and Constable Kunal Malik.In another major operation, STF Additional SP Rakesh, Deputy SP Dharmesh Kumar Shahi, Inspector Satya Prakash Singh, and Sub-Inspector Yashwant Singh received gallantry medals for the encounter of Pankaj Yadav, a notorious sharpshooter linked to mafia don Mukhtar Ansari and carrying a ₹1 lakh bounty.Yadav was killed on August 7, 2024, near a forest area close to Farah police station in Mathura district. He had allegedly spread terror across eastern Uttar Pradesh and Bihar for nearly 16 years and was involved in contract killings for organised crime syndicates.According to the STF, Yadav and his associates were heading towards Agra to carry out a planned murder and robbery of a businessman when they were intercepted near Rausu village on National Highway-19. This led to a gunfight in which Yadav was killed. Police records show that he was wanted in over two dozen cases, including multiple murders and other serious offences.Apart from the gallantry awards, four officers received the President’s Medal for Distinguished Service, while 68 personnel were honoured with the Medal for Meritorious Service, officials said.