Tight security for ‘Sivaji’

Tight security for ‘Sivaji’

Staff Reporter



AGE NO BAR: Fans of Rajnikanth waiting in queue to buy tickets for ’Sivaji’ at Urvasi cinema in Bangalore on Thursday. Some of them had turned up early on Wednesday.

BANGALORE: The Bangalore police have made elaborate security arrangements for the screening of the Rajnikanth-starrer Sivaji, which is being released on Friday.

Additional Commissioner of Police (Law and Order) Bipin Gopalakrishna told presspersons on Thursday that policemen would be deployed at all cinemas and multiplexes that would be screening the Tamil film.

Security is being tightened in the wake of Karnataka Rakshana Vedike threatening to storm the cinemas. Since the Cauvery Water Disputes Tribunal announced its final award a few months ago, the vedike activists have been staging protests near cinemas screening Tamil films.

Meanwhile, the vedike activists on Thursday staged a demonstration in front of the Karnataka Film Chamber of Commerce here alleging that the chamber had permitted the screening of Sivaji in more cinemas in violation of its own regul ations. Apparently fearing violence by Kannada activists, the cinemas in the city, which are to screen Sivaji, have displayed very few posters, banners or cutouts and all are in Kannada.

Meanwhile, sources in the city police told The Hindu that they have already held meetings with Kannada organisations, including the vedike, and appealed to its leaders to hold peaceful protests