Student leader Neha Bora was released at dawn on Saturday and Cockroach Janta Party founder Abhijeet Dipke received bail in the evening from a
special executive magistrate — a designated senior police officer.
Both had been taken into preventive custody on Friday before they could carry out a Tiranga March at Central Park — which was shut after the protest call — in Connaught Place.
Neha, president of CPIML Liberation student arm AISA, was released from Ramakrishna Puram police station after completing the formalities relating to her detention under Section 65 of the Delhi Police Act.
Section 65 allows the police to briefly detain individuals to maintain public order and release them once the immediate situation has been handled.
Questions have been raised whether Neha’s overnight detention was legal.
Calcutta-based criminal lawyer Sk Salim Rahman said Section 65 deals with the public’s obligation to obey reasonable police orders and the police’s powers when those orders are ignored.
“The section mentions the police’s powers of taking action only when orders are ignored. This means there has to be a commission of offence. In this case, she was detained without any commission of offence, hence that can’t be termed legal,” Rahmansaid.
The Tiranga March had been called as part of the ongoing agitation to remove chief election commissioner Gyanesh Kumar for his allegedly unilateral and illegal decisions relating to the ongoing SIR that has deleted 13 crore names from the electoral rolls.
It was called also against the arrest of CJP leaders for “trespassing” on Tuesday into Jantar Mantar — following its de-notification as a designated protest site — and waving the national flag. CJP leaders Saurav Das and Ashutosh Ranka remain in judicialcustody.
After her release, Neha told reporters: “The current movement has clearly exposed how people are being detained, whether during the day or in the evening, held in custody throughout the night, and only released the following morning or evening. Under what authority is this justified?”
AISA did not hold any protests on Saturday. “We have all been up all night. Neha was already under medication for an ailment and needs rest,” a source told The Telegraph.
Sources said Dipke had been arrested for allegedly violating a peace bond he had signed, undertaking not to disturb public peace for one year, after his October 10 detention, and for defying direct police warnings. Dipke argues that holding a peaceful protest does not violate the bond.
The police had registered multiple FIRs alleging violations of a ban on assemblies in Connaught Place, and the obstruction of public servants, ahead of the CJP’s “Lehra Do Tiranga” programme onFriday.
Officials have, however, not revealed the exact number of FIRs registered or all the legal provisions invoked. According to the police, more than 100 protesters were detained as crowds gathered near Central Park and Palika Bazaar on Friday.
“Despite repeated announcements asking people to disperse, a crowd gathered in and around Connaught Place on Friday, prompting the police to initiate legal action,” an official said.
Saturday witnessed sporadic protests. Demonstrations were held near Jantar Mantar Road to reclaim the area as a designated protest site. Left women’s groups protested near the police headquarters against the alleged molestation and serious injuries suffered by women protesters during policeaction.
Lok Sabha Opposition leader Rahul Gandhi met some of the women who had faced police action and shared a video of the interactionon X.
“Sexual harassment, dragging clothes, and assaults on private parts — the brutality of the Delhi Police against students and women raising their voices for democracy has crossed shameful limits,” he wrote.
“This is all part of that conspiracy to silence voices, where you scare them so much, humiliate them so deeply, that no one dares to raise questions again.
“Modi-Shah know that the day power slips from their hands, that day the story of their whims ends. It is this very fear that reaches the police and unleashes as violence on the country’s youth and women.”
The Congress has been granted police permission for the INDIA bloc’s rally against Gyanesh on November 1 at the Ramlila Maidan, the designated protest site now closest to the seat of power.
Additional reporting by Monalisa Chaudhuri from Calcutta