Sabarimala Row: Six BJP workers nabbed for violating Section 144

Police lathi-charge protesters after they opposed the entry of women of the menstrual age group into the hill shrine. Pic/PTI

Six BJP youth wing activists were arrested at Nilackal on Thursday for staging a protest in violation of Section 144 of CrPC, which has been clamped in the area in view of violent demonstrations against allowing women in the menstruating age group inside the Sabarimala temple.

Police removed the slogan-shouting Bharatiya Janata Yuva Morcha (BJYM) members, who launched a sit-in protest at Nilackal, the gateway to Sabarimala, soon after the BJP state president P S Sreedharan Pillai announced in Thiruvananthapuram that BJYM activists would violate section 144 in areas, including Nilackal.

While being forcibly bundled into a police vehicle, state BJYM president Prakash Babu said not a single woman in the age group of 10 to 50 would be allowed to climb the hills which houses the temple.

Police said strong action would be taken against those disrupting law and order. The cops had on Wednesday also promulgated section 144 of CrPc in four places, including Pamba, Sannidhanam, to check any kind of protest or violence. Section 144 of the CrPC prohibits an assembly of more than four persons in an area.

Tense moments prevailed at Pamba and Nilackal at the foothill on Wednesday as protesters opposing the Supreme Court order had turned violent and clashed with police, which resulted in baton-charge by the latter.

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