As many as 24 Congress leaders including K.B. Prasanna Kumar, former MLA, who were staging a protest at Mahatma Gandhi Park in the city on Monday against the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) were detained by the police.
The Shivamogga District Congress Committee had announced a dawn-to-dusk fasting as a token of protest against the Act. Police arrived at Mahatma Gandhi Park at 11 a.m. and detained the Congress leaders for staging protest at the public place without taking their permission.
The detained leaders were taken to the parade ground of District Armed Reserve Police and were released later. Speaking to presspersons later, Mr. Kumar alleged that the Bharatiya Janata Party that is in power in Centre and in the State was using police force to intimidate its political opponents.
He said that, as CAA proposed to accord citizenship on the basis of religion, it was discriminatory by nature and was against the principles of secularism and equality enshrined in the Constitution.
Alleging that the National Register of Citizens (NRC) and CAA were exercises of communal enumeration, he said that the BJP was trying to create rift in the society for political gains. He expressed displeasure that, instead of listening to the apprehensions of the Muslims and the tribals on CAA, the Centre was trying to coerce them.
