Bengaluru city police detained at least 50 students of the All India Students’ Association (AISA) at Freedom Park on Saturday before they could begin a planned march to the office of the Karnataka Chief Electoral Officer, The Hindu reported. The students were protesting against the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls and demanding the resignation of Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar.
The protesters said they were detained while still inside Freedom Park, Bengaluru’s designated protest site, and before crossing barricades erected at both ends of the premises. They alleged that the police had deployed a large number of personnel and blocked roads to prevent the march from reaching the Karnataka Chief Electoral Officer’s office, located a few hundred metres away.
According to the students, the police took the detained protesters away in different buses. Other AISA members said they were unable to establish whether all those detained had been taken to one police station or were being held at different locations. Some protesters were believed to be at a police station, while fellow students tried to contact others, The Hindu reported.
The planned march was intended to demand that deletions from the electoral rolls at the draft stage be scrapped. The protesters referred to 1.07 crore names reported as absent, shifted or dead during the revision process. They also sought the resignation of the Chief Election Commissioner.
AISA Karnataka and other Left student organisations condemned the detentions, describing them as a restriction on the democratic right to protest. The students said the police action took place before the march had begun and while they remained within the designated protest venue. The account of the detentions and the circumstances leading to them was based on statements from the protesters cited by The Hindu; the report did not include a police response.
The incident has placed attention on how Bengaluru manages demonstrations at Freedom Park, a space designated for public protests, when participants seek to move beyond the venue towards government offices. The immediate issue is not only the detention of the students but also the operational limits placed on assemblies, marches and access to public institutions in the city.
AISA members said they would stage another agitation at the police station if the detained students were not released. The organisation also criticised the Congress-led Karnataka government, arguing that its handling of the protest contradicted the party’s opposition to the SIR at the national level. The students questioned whether the right to protest was being treated differently when the party was in power than when it was in opposition.
The next developments will depend on the release or continued detention of the students, their location, and any response from the Bengaluru city police or the Karnataka government.
