Youth Congress leader trying to protest near PM's convoy route detained

Two persons including Karnataka Youth Congress President Mohammed Haris Nalapad were taken into preventive custody on Saturday as they tried to protest near Mekhri circle here, some 300 metres from the route where Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s convoy was about to move, police said. It is not a case of any kind of security breach, they said.

They tried to stage a protest holding an empty ‘Chombu’ (a small, round water container) on a by-lane which was near the route where Modi’s convoy was scheduled to move after the campaign rally on the Palace grounds here.

”We have taken two people into preventive custody. So, before the PM’s convoy was about to approach, they tried to stage a protest on a by-lane. We immediately stopped them,” a senior police officer said.

The Congress in Karnataka has been running the ‘Chombu’ campaign alleging reduced devolution of funds, neglect of drought-hit regions and to highlight ”glaring disparities” by the BJP-led NDA government. Chombu means water pot in Kannada. The Congress had launched a sarcasm-laced campaign alleging that the Modi government’s gift to Karnataka was ‘Chombu’. The term ‘Chombu’ symbolises deception and emptiness.