PTI Police take away a woman during the ‘kiss of love’ protest in Kozhikode on Sunday.
The ‘Kiss of Love’ protest against moral policing on Sunday was marred by sporadic violence in parts of Kozhikode with those for and against it coming to blows leading to a tense situation, following which police chased them away with lathis and took few of them into custody.
About 20 pro-kiss protesters first converged at the mofussil bus stand in Kozhikode by about 3 p.m. where about 100 spectators and supporters of an outfit called Hanuman Sena had gathered.
When the activists started kissing, the spectators rushed towards them. Police tried to chase them away and took into custody the protesters and supporters of the Hanuman Sena.
Television footage showed protesters being dragged by police.
Kozhikode Police commissioner A.V. George confirmed that some activists of the ‘Kiss of Love’ and Hanuman Sena have been taken into custody.
“They were taken into custody as a precautionary measure and will be let off without registering any case,”, he later told reporters.
Unlike in Kochi, the organisers of the ‘Kiss of Love’ protest had decided to hold the agitation in different streets of Kozhikode, naming the protest as ‘Kiss in the Street’.
At Mithai Theruvu (sweat meat street) famous for Kozhikode halwas, activists allegedly belonging to the Shiv Sena, attacked documentary film maker Didi Damodaran and her husband after they kissed each other, expressing solidarity with the protest.
Poet and filmmaker Jayan K. Cherian, who was also taken into custody by police, said he had not come to participate in the protest.
“A middle-aged couple were standing there holding hands and were taken into custody. I was explaining this to a TV channel when I was also taken into custody,” Mr. Cherian said.
Describing the police action as shameful, he said the ‘Kiss of Love’ activists should have been given space to protest. They were arrested immediately after they reached the bus stand and this was against democratic procedures, he said.
“These people were only exercising their right and they were forcibly taken into custody by police,” he told a television channel.
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