Opposition parties have mounted a blistering attack on the Yogi Adityanath government in Uttar Pradesh over the killing of eight policemen in Kanpur on Friday.

Samajwadi Party president Akhilesh Yadav tweeted that the incident was one of the 'most shameful' incidents that reveals the nexus between criminals and those in power.

"It is the dedicated police personnel who have paid the price today," he tweeted.

He further said that the accused must be arrested so that the nexus can be revealed.

UPCC president Ajay Kumar Lallu said that the Yogi government has lost control of governance and the law and order had completely collapsed.

"This incident is proof of the fact that there is no government in the state. It is jungle raj where even the police is not safe," he said.

Meanwhile, the family members of Vikas Dubey, the main accused in the killing of eight police personnel on Friday, are now claiming that Dubey has not been home since the past two days.

A woman relative, possibly his sister-in-law, told TV channels that Vikas Dubey had not come home since the past two days and it was the police that fired at the house in the wee hours of Friday.

Two other members of the family who refused to identify themselves, said that 'some people' may have come on their roof during the incident but Vikas was not present.

The local villagers, meanwhile, also claimed that they were not present in the village when the firing took place.

"I thought it was a tyre-burst," said one while the others claimed that they were sleeping in the fields and learnt about the incident in the morning.

None of the villagers admitted to knowing Vikas Dubey personally or having seen him in the village.

Dubey, sources said, owned about half a dozen properties in the village and wielded tremendous clout in the region as well as in the corridors of power.