Lucknow, Dec 20 (IANS): The internet services have been shut down in seven cities of Uttar Pradesh including Lucknow.

The cities that are facing a complete internet shutdown include Lucknow, Bareilly, Aligarh, Ghaziabad, Prayagraj, Sambhal, Meerut, Mau and Kanpur.

This has been done after Thursday's protests over the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) turned violent in Lucknow and Sambhal and led to large scale destruction of public and private property.

Additional Chief Secretary (Home) Avanish Awasthi said that the shutdown would continue till December 21 midnight. All private telecom operators have also shutdown their service after the government order.

This has been done in view of protests planned after Friday prayers in several cities.

According to a senior police official, it was found late on Thursday night that the violent protests on Thursday were being live-streamed on the social media which aggravated the situation.

"Apart from the internet, SMS and messenger services have also been blocked. We are trying to inform our customers about this," said a private telecom manager in Lucknow.

The shutdown is mainly going to impact the news industry, which is largely dependent on internet for news transmission.