Rally puts brakes on city

Rally puts brakes on city
The Times of India

Bangalore: For the second consecutive day, life was thrown completely out of gear. Office-goers and students alike were stranded for hours, when hundreds of Dalit Sangarha Samiti (DSS) converged at the MG statue on Tuesday. The DSS members were protesting against acquisition of land for NICE’s BMIC project.

Farmers from across the state arrived in droves early in the morning. Tempos and buses that ferried them were parked haphazardly near MG Road and Cubbon Road before police diverted them into Cubbon Park.


Till noon, the protesters crowded the footpath outside Mahatma Gandhi park shouting slogans against NICE. After some local leaders arrived, the entire crowd sat in a dharna at the busy junction, blocking traffic.

Vehicles piled up on MG Road, Kasturba Road, Cubbon Road, Infantry Road and Raj Bhavan Road. An hour later, roads around Vidhana Soudha, KR Circle and Richmond Circle were clogged.

The police, however, were caught off guard having to deal with over 1,000 protesters staging a rasta roko.

To add to the chaos was another protest at Banappa Park near Ulsoor Gate. Two rowdy gangs that clashed near Hudson Circle brought traffic to a grinding halt in the area.

On Monday, protests by members of Karnataka State Government Daily Wage Employees Federation and Kannada Rakhana Vedike had disrupted traffic in many parts of the city.