Hyderabad: The Hyderabad “Million March” turned up to be surprise for the police as more than two lakh citizens turned up to protest against the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) and the National Register of Citizens (NRC) at Indira Park Dharna Chowk on Saturday.
Since Friday night police had carried a campaign on the social media saying, “The police permission has been given to only 1000 persons, no more gathering will be permitted”. But the public least carried away by the social media campaign of police and took out on to city roads in large numbers.
The Telangana and Andhra Pradesh Joint Action Committee (JAC) against CAA and NRC have organized a Million March at Indira Park Dharna Chowk, it had also obtained a police permission from the hyderabad police, although police have accorded permission for the March the police had meticulously added a clause in the permission allowing only one thousand people at Dharna chowk.
It is alleged that in order to create confusion in the minds of the public, police have vigorously made the restriction of gathering messages viral on social media. That’s not all, Hyderabad police have also tweeted declaring restricting public to one thousand only.
“There has been an effort by the police to stop public from joining the Million March at Dharna chowk, but the public has given a befitting reply by turning out to the event in Millions,” said JAC convenor Mushtaq Malik.
The protest, however, was a victory for the organizers, who were first refused permission to conduct a rally at Hyderabad’s Necklace Road. The permission to hold the public meeting at Dharna Chowk was given after the organizers approached the Telangana High Court, which asked the city police to reconsider the application for the protest. The cops finally allowed for the meeting to be held from 2 to 5 pm.
The anti-CAA and NRC sentiments among citizens, huge public turned up of the protest much before the starting of the March from 2 pm, with the incessant pouring of public from twin cities at Dharna chowk at 3 pm, the police opened the NTR Stadium behind Dharna Chowk, in which many of the protestors were accommodated.