Photo: Pulakit Singh / Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0
Delhi Police on Friday took Cockroach Janta Party founder Abhijeet Dipke into preventive detention as he left a residence for the group’s planned ‘Lehra Do Tiranga’ gathering at Central Park in Connaught Place, and later detained All India Students’ Association president Neha Bora and other protesters near Mandi House as they marched toward the hub with the national flag.
A police official told Dipke he was being held under Section 163 prohibitory orders in force in Connaught Place, according to footage from the scene. Dipke argued he had not broken the law and asked officers to name an alternative venue. It was the second time in less than a week that police had stopped him before a CJP demonstration in Delhi.
Park shut, smaller crowd, heavy deployment
The New Delhi Municipal Council said Central Park would stay closed to the public on October 16 and 17 for administrative reasons. Delhi Police had urged Dipke to call off the evening event, citing traffic, public safety and inconvenience to traders and commuters, and offered a small group a chance to wave the flag and sing the anthem elsewhere.
CJP then told supporters to enter Connaught Place in groups of fewer than five, unfurl the tricolour, photograph themselves and leave. By the scheduled start, reporters put the crowd near the park in the low hundreds—smaller than earlier CJP marches—while thousands of police and paramilitary personnel remained around the Inner Circle. BBC journalists saw young protesters detained and put into a bus that already held women detainees.
Student groups and MPs still reach the park
Despite the detentions, several columns pressed on. AISA members led by Neha Bora gathered near Mandi House and began walking toward Connaught Place before police circled and detained them. A Students’ Federation of India group was stopped at Janpath–Tolstoy Marg, on the approach to Jantar Mantar.
Later, CPI(M) MP John Brittas, with MPs V. Sivadasan and A.A. Rahim and workers of SFI, DYFI, AISF and AIYF, reached Central Park with about 100 protesters, live updates said. Brittas said they had been told nobody would be allowed into Connaught Place and claimed they had still reached the central area. The Aam Aadmi Party also took out a tiranga march from its headquarters toward Connaught Place and was stopped on the way.
Detaining a lone man walking with the national flag in his hand is a bit of a joke.
Anish Gawande, NCP-SP spokesperson, at whose residence Dipke had been staying
Why Friday’s march was called
Friday’s call was framed as solidarity after CJP co-conveners Saurav Das and Ashutosh Ranka were remanded to five days’ judicial custody on October 14 for allegedly trespassing at Jantar Mantar, which authorities had recently taken off Delhi’s list of approved protest sites. The wider campaign seeks the resignation of Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar over alleged irregularities in electoral rolls and the Special Intensive Revision; the Election Commission denies the charges.
Police notices ahead of the march cited earlier demonstrations, including attempted marches toward Parliament, and warned that a large gathering in Connaught Place could choke traffic, hurt businesses and block emergency vehicles. Traders again said repeated protests had cut festive-season sales. AISA later said it did not know Neha Bora’s whereabouts after her detention and demanded Delhi Police disclose where she was being held.
The face-off keeps alive a week-long standoff over where citizens may protest near the centres of power, with Jantar Mantar already denotified and Central Park closed for the weekend even as flag-bearing groups tried to enter Connaught Place.
