Maharashtra Police begin cracking down on anti-CAA protests

Shiv Kumar
Tribune News Service
Mumbai, February 3

Advertisement

After weeks of protests against the Citizenship (Amendment) Act across the state, the Maharashtra Police have begun to crack down on protesters.

Over the past three days, the Mumbai police have been detaining protesters in the city’s Nagpada area where a large group of women is staging a Shaheen Bagh kind of protest.

On Monday morning, a few women were detained from the area which is being called Mumbai Bagh on social media.

Lawyer and activist Trisha Shetty posted on Twitter, “targetted for exercising my fundamental right to peacefully protest against CAA/NRC.”

Another activist, Aamir Edresy, said the protesting women planned to meet the Maharashtra home minister to complain against the detention of protesters.

According to Edresy, women from the Nagpada area are continuing their protests. After the police asked the women to leave the area early Sunday morning, scores of people from the neighbourhood descended on the roads and continued protesting.

The city police this afternoon issued a notice under Section 149 under the Criminal Penal Code.

As per this code, police officers are empowered to prevent any cognisable offence.

The Mumbai Bagh protests began on Republic Day.

At other places across Mumbai, the police began rounding up women in order to prevent a repeat of Mumbai Bagh.

This morning some ten women protesting against the CAA at the Ambedkar Gardens at Mumbai’s Deonar were detained by the police on the grounds that they did not have prior permission. They were however released this afternoon.