New Delhi: Protestors against the citizenship law at Shaheen Bagh were vacated by the Delhi Police amid coronavirus outbreak on Tuesday morning, officials said.
The women agitators have been on a sit-in at Shaheen Bagh for over three months, protesting the newly amended Citizenship Act.
Deputy Commissioner of Police (southeast) R P Meena said people at the protest venue in Shaheen Bagh were requested to vacate the site as lockdown has been imposed due to coronavirus outbreak.
However, when they refused action was taken and they were vacated, the official said.
The Kalindi Kunj road, which had been closed for traffic for three months, will reportedly be opened soon amid the lockdown in the national capital.
Marking a symbolic presence, the protesters had left their slippers and sandals at the site. “We are not ending the protest, come what may. But we are aware of the danger posed by Covid-19, so we adopted this type of protest for the day,” Khurshid Alam, one of the organisers of the protest, had said on Sunday.
The crowd at the usually bustling tent had been scaled down to five protesters on Sunday following the call for Janata Curfew to arrest the spread of coronavirus. Sanitisers and masks had been arranged in enough numbers, and the protest site was being disinfected at regular intervals, a protester said.
Alam further said that the women above 60 and children were not allowed at the protest site.
The anti-CAA protest has been going on at Shaheen Bagh since December 15 last year.