Akhilesh's sops a day before Modi's Kanpur trip

Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav Friday inaugurated a hi-tech police control room and flagged off a fleet of police cars in Kanpur, a day before Narendra Modi visits the city.

Kanpur is 108 km from the state capital.

Later, Yadav addressed a gathering of special police officials and directed the police to maintain law and order at all costs and control crime through technological advances.

Yadav said this is the first such hi-tech control room, equipped with CCTV cameras and GPS, in the state. He said the state would get more such centres and added that police modernisation was his government's priority.

The chief minister also laid foundation stones of several other development projects, including power, roads, multi-level parkings and houses for the economically weaker sections.

Yadav's visit a day before Bharatiya Janata Party's (BJP) prime ministrial candidate Narendra Modi lands in the city to start the BJP campaign for the 2014 Lok Sabha polls set off speculation that the chief minister wanted to sell his development model before Modi did the same.

BJP spokesman Chandra Mohan took a dig at the chief minister's hurried visit to Kanpur and called it a "result of the fear that Modi's popularity has instilled in his opponents".