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Deployment, detention, surveillance: How Delhi Police kept Jantar Mantar off-limits
Delhi Police gathered organisers’ personal details, monitored their movements and checked hotel registers before Saturday’s protest, officers said.
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In the days before Saturday’s protest, Delhi Police collected the home addresses, mobile numbers and social media accounts of the people organising it, tracked their movements and checked hotel registers across the city, according to officers who asked not to be named.
Detentions across Delhi
On Saturday, police detained political leaders, key organisers of the Cockroach Janta Party (CJP), members of organisations backing the protest and even journalists at Delhi airport, at hotels and guest houses, and at their homes.
The entire strategy, from the deployment of security personnel to the surveillance of organisers and the creation of temporary detention centres in stadiums, community centres and police stations across the city, was drawn up by the top brass of the police force, the officers said.
“The overall supervision was being done by top officials in the Union home ministry. The instructions were to ensure there is no repeat of the Jantar Mantar 1.0 protest and detain protesters wherever they are seen,” one of the officers said, referring to the CJP’s month-long protest at the site in July.
Multiple police teams monitored social media and tracked the movements of CJP founder Abhijeet Dipke and co-convenors Saurav Das and Ashutosh Ranka, activists Yogendra Yadav and Prashant Bhushan, and student leaders including Neha Bora, a second officer said.
Personal details of important individuals collected
“Personal details of all important individuals, including CJP and students’ leaders, such as their residential addresses, mobile numbers and social media accounts, were collected and shared with the police teams for electronic surveillance and ground monitoring as well. The officials of the crime branch and special cell were asked to track their movements,” the second officer said.
The tracking allowed police to follow Dipke, Das and Ranka in Mumbai and to detain them at Delhi airport after their flight landed, the officers said.
Plainclothes personnel were also posted outside the homes, hotels, guest houses and other establishments where key organisers were staying, according to the officers, with police vehicles parked nearby to follow them when they moved, the officer cited above said.
For two to three days before the protest, beat officers visited hotels and guest houses across Delhi, asking staff whether people had checked in as groups.
“The strategy helped us know who is staying at what place. Such guests included independent journalists. Accordingly, deployment of personnel and police vehicles was made. Many such people were either detained as they came out of the hotels and guest houses and tried to march towards Jantar Mantar. A few were even asked to stay inside if they did not want to be detained,” the first officer said.
Also read: CJP asks ‘where is Abhijeet’ after Delhi Police say Dipke was informed of grandmother’s death
Accounts of being followed and detained
Among the first to be detained was the CJP’s legal head, Ratna Singh, who was picked up near her home in Jangpura around 9am, after she returned there. Some 20-25 police personnel had been stationed outside since Friday.
“The police personnel blocked our car with their vehicles and told me that I was not allowed to move towards Jantar Mantar. They kept me detained inside their vehicle till 5pm. Thereafter, they told me to stay inside my house. I even made a call to the police control room and filed a plea in the court, seeking an FIR against my illegal detention. The policemen had been tailing since Friday,” Singh said. The plea was filed at the Saket Courts but dismissed by the court as “defective” in form.
Also read: CJP protest: The law that allows Delhi Police to set up barricades, checkpoints and restrict traffic
Activist Yogendra Yadav posted videos on social media saying police personnel in a white vehicle were following him as he travelled towards Jantar Mantar, and in one of them said he feared he would be kidnapped. He later joined Neha Bora, head of the All India Students’ Association (AISA), advocate Prashant Bhushan and other protesters marching towards Dilli Haat at INA Market, before police detained them and put them in buses.
HT reached out to the Delhi Police and the Union Home Ministry seeking a response but did not receive any by the time of going to press.
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