More than 800 people were detained across several states on Saturday as police moved to prevent protests demanding the resignation of Chief Election Commissioner (CEC) Gyanesh Kumar over alleged irregularities in the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls. The largest crackdown was reported in Mumbai, where police detained around 600 people supporting a nationwide movement led by the Cockroach Janta Party (CJP).
In Mumbai, more than 300 police personnel were deployed around Nana Chowk in south Mumbai to prevent protesters from reaching August Kranti Maidan, the proposed venue of a demonstration organised by civil society collective ‘Hum Bharat Ke Log’, led by Tushar Gandhi, great-grandson of Mahatma Gandhi.
Police used drones to monitor the gathering and detained protesters, taking them to seven police stations. The crackdown began around 3.45pm as protesters gathered, raising slogans such as “Vote chor, gaddi chhod” (vote thief, vacate your seat). Police vans lined the streets, while officers broke up human chains and detained people, including Tushar Gandhi, his daughter Kasturi Gandhi, actor Imran Khan, Shiv Sena (UBT) MLA Varun Sardesai and CPI leader Prakash Reddy.
Police also stopped bystanders, checked their identity cards and questioned them about their presence in the area. “Regardless of the detentions, we will continue the struggle. This is a struggle for freeing and revamping every institution in such a way that instead of serving the powerful, they support the ordinary citizen. Until that is achieved, the struggle will go on,” Tushar Gandhi said.
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Ayushi Jain (26), a visual artist who participated in the protest, said, “I have become concerned about how CEC Gyanesh Kumar was put in charge of an undemocratic exercise and how names have been struck off the electoral rolls. There is panic everywhere. The Election Commission was supposed to worry about this. Now the roles have been reversed. If a constitutional body is acting this way, then the same Constitution gives us the right to protest.”
CJP workers said they had emailed the Mumbai Police seeking permission to protest but received no response. Police, however, maintained that no permission had been sought and said protests were allowed only at Azad Maidan under Bombay high court directions. “We are in the process of registering cases, which will continue late into the night,” said a police officer.
In Bengaluru, police detained around 50 protesters belonging to left student organisations, including the All India Students’ Association (AISA) and the Students’ Federation of India (SFI), as they marched towards the state election commission office.
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AISA said in a statement: “While the Leader of the Opposition in the national capital stands on barricades, breaks through them and speaks about the right to protest, his own party’s government in Karnataka is resorting to the same tactics of barricading roads and preventing people from exercising that very right.”
In Chennai, nearly 130 protesters were detained in two separate incidents. Around 40 students protesting near Besant Nagar beach and another 90 people who gathered near Fort St George, which houses the state secretariat, were detained. All were released later in the day. “This is undeclared Emergency,” said DMK president M K Stalin.
In Goa, opposition parties and civil society activists held a demonstration at Panaji’s Azad Maidan under the banner of ‘Ami Goynche Rakhondar’ (we are the protectors of Goa), demanding Kumar’s resignation and cancellation of the SIR exercise in the state.
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In Jaipur, more than 50 people planning to travel to Delhi for the protest at Jantar Mantar were detained, police said. CJP functionary Deepak Baliyan alleged that police took him from his home in Alwar district . He also alleged that officers beat him. Kathumar police station in-charge Chandrashekhar Sharma dismissed the allegations as “baseless”. In Chandigarh, several leaders, including Sisodia and Baltej Punia, were later detained.
