Just One Question for the Bengaluru Police

BENGALURU: You used lethal force against thousands of peaceful, repeat PEACEFUL, and mostly female textile workers who went on strike over sudden changes in Provident Fund rules last April. Changes in rules that were immediately withdrawn by the central government, meaning your brutal violence against the workers was entirely in vain and uncalled for.

You waste much time in needlessly harassing children with your brainless 'Operation Smile' (picking up innocent kids who perhaps looked scruffy and who were briefly out on the street running an errand for their parents).

You regularly harass and behave horribly with indigent and independent sex workers, i.e. those not working in brothels and 'dance halls' beholden to your officers and constables. You also treat transgender people as if they were criminals.

You equally regularly and routinely mete out needless violence against street vendors, including in areas that have been part of traditional 'santhe' ('chanday') since times immemorial and including against those vendors from whom you collect your illegal 'hafta' as many times a day as your officers and constables please.

You file an FIR against Amnesty International at the behest of the despicable ABVP goons, while ignoring the disruption of an entirely peaceful meeting on Kashmir last August by the said hoodlums.

You most often disallow human rights activists from organising PEACEFUL rallies and demonstrations, confining them to a couple of tiny spaces such as the Town Hall steps and Mysore Bank Circle where you intimidate them with your presence in strength, turning your video cameras on them.

But you were reluctant to prevent women being molested on Brigade Rd-MG Rd during the New Year, or to come to their aid when it was sought? And are dragging your feet in filing FIRs against the criminals acting under your noses? And have not arrested any one responsible for this mass scale assault on women.

Why?

(Cover Photograph: Mass molestation of girls on New years eve met with indifferent police response. Courtesy Bangalore Mirror)