The Hindu : Gathering of Ram bhakts thwarted in Lucknow

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Thursday, Oct 16, 2003

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Gathering of Ram bhakts thwarted in Lucknow

By J.P. Shukla

Photo: R. V. Moorthy

Acharya Dharmendra, Pravin Togadia and other Vishwa Hindu Parishad leaders at a rally in New Delhi on Wednesday, demanding the construction of a Ram temple at Ayodhya.

LUCKNOW Oct. 15. The Vishwa Hindu Parishad's "Ram bhakt" rally and "shobha yatra" in Lucknow were conducted in a low-key manner today as a determined Uttar Pradesh Government prevented any largescale gathering.

The rally remained limited to a small meeting within the precincts of the Saraswati Shishu Mandir, run by the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh, in the Nirala Nagar locality at which the senior VHP vice-president, Giriraj Kishore, was among those who addressed the gathering.

Around noon, the activists, many of them wearing saffron scarves, came out of the Shishu Mandir in vehicles and on foot. As they started marching ahead in an apparent bid to take out the announced "shobha yatra" they were stopped a little away by the police who had erected barricades.

The slogan-raising VHP activists, a majority of whom were outsiders, waited for some time and then courted arrest. They were taken away in five buses chartered by the police.

While Giriraj Kishore and another senior VHP leader, Purushottam Narain Singh, were detained in the State Guest House in the Dalibagh locality, about 300 arrested VHP workers were sent to jail, the Chief Secretary, A.P. Singh, said, briefing newspersons in the evening.

Giving details of the situation prevailing in the State in the wake of the VHP programme at Ayodhya on Friday, Mr. Singh said that arrests of VHP workers going to Ayodhya were continuing and so far 15,500 people had been taken into custody all over the State.

About 10,600 people continued to be detained while the other arrested activists had been released. The largest number of arrests was made in Varanasi (2,788). More than 1,000 people each had been arrested in Kanpur, Jhansi and Allahabad. In Faizabad, 480 people were arrested today.

Rail traffic to and from Ayodhya remained almost static with the authorities having diverted only two trains — the Sabarmati Express and the Doon Express. Other trains were running through Ayodhya as usual.

The Chief Secretary said the situation was under continuous observation and more trains could be diverted during the next two days, if necessary.

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