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The founder of India’s “cockroach” protest movement, Abhijeet Dipke, has been detained in Delhi ahead of a planned march in the heart of the capital.<\/b><\/p>\n
His detention follows a police warning against holding Friday’s march, with thousands of security personnel deployed across the city to prevent the gathering.<\/p>\n
Dipke’s youth-led Cockroach Janta Party (CJP) is demanding the resignation of India’s election chief over allegations of voter list manipulation. The Election Commission denies the charge.<\/p>\n
The group had asked its supporters to come to a park in Connaught Place, one of Delhi’s busiest commercial districts, to wave the Indian flag.<\/p>\n
The turnout was smaller than at earlier CJP demonstrations though the crowd seemed to be swelling. The BBC saw some young protesters being detained and shoved into a bus which already held some female detainees – there were about 50 female police personnel in the bus, vastly outnumbering the protesters.<\/p>\n
Dipke had just left home and was moments away from reaching his vehicle when the BBC saw police officers surround him and force him into a police car. Some CJP supporters tried to block the vehicle from leaving.<\/p>\n
Anish Gawande, the opposition politician at whose house Dipke had been staying, questioned why police had detained him. Police have not yet publicly confirmed the grounds for the detention.<\/p>\n
“Detaining a lone man walking with the national flag in his hand is a bit of a joke,” Gawande said.<\/p>\n
It was the second time in less than a week that Dipke was detained. Last Saturday, police boarded his plane<\/a> shortly after it landed in Delhi and took him away before he could reach a planned demonstration.<\/p>\n Police barricades and mass detentions prevented thousands of other protesters from reaching the venue. Dipke was released the following day, but two other CJP leaders – Saurav Das and Ashutosh Ranka – were later jailed for five days<\/a> after entering Jantar Mantar, a protest site recently declared off-limits by police. <\/p>\n Friday’s march was partly intended to show solidarity with the two jailed leaders.<\/p>\n Dipke had acknowledged the possibility of being arrested again. In a video message on Thursday, he urged supporters unable to travel to Delhi to raise the Indian flag in their own towns and cities.<\/p>\n “I also may be jailed after this, but I am not worried. Tricolour is my pride and I will raise it,” he said.<\/p>\n Earlier on Friday, police had served Dipke with a notice warning him against holding the march without permission.<\/p>\n Authorities also closed Central Park for two days, citing “administrative reasons”. Police offered to let a small group wave the national flag and sing the anthem at another location.<\/p>\n The CJP responded by changing its plans, urging supporters to enter Connaught Place in groups of fewer than five, unfurl the flag, take a photograph and leave.<\/p>\n “Waving the Tiranga is not a crime,” the group said in a social media poster, using the Hindi name for India’s tricolour flag. It encouraged supporters to share their photographs online.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n