Delhi Police uses water cannon on protesters over water shortage
The Delhi Police on Saturday used a water cannon to disperse BJP workers demonstrating against the AAP government over water shortage in the the national capital. Led by the BJP's former South Delhi MP Ramesh Bidhuri, the protesters gathered outside a Delhi Jal Board (DJB) office in Okhla and raised slogans against the AAP government. The police dispersed them with a water cannon after they refused to move.
Amid a punishing heat wave battering the city, Delhi is facing a severe water shortage while the BJP and AAP continue to blame each other for the crisis. Addressing the protesters, Bidhuri alleged that the DJB, which had profits of Rs 600 crore, is now facing losses of Rs 60,000 crore due to corruption.
He later handed over a memorandum to a DJB engineer over an acute shortage of water in the Tughlaqabad assembly constituency. Meanwhile, Delhi Water Minister Atishi's indefinite hunger strike for release of the city's "rightful share" of water share in the Yamuna by Haryana entered its second day on Saturday.
Atishi launched her hunger strike, accusing the BJP government in Haryana of stopping the release of 100 million gallons per day (MGD) of water to Delhi and said it has affected 28 lakh people in the city.
Police on Wednesday used water cannons and dragged women protestors across the road to disperse activists of the Kerala Students' Union (KSU) who held marches in Kannur and Palakkad districts against the Left government in the state.
The student activists were raising the issue of alleged shortage of plus-one seats in schools across the northern Kerala region of Malabar.
The Left government has been facing flak over the issue after a girl student in Parappanangadi in Malappuram district in the region died by suicide on June 11 allegedly over anxiety about whether she would get a seat for plus-one (class 11) to continue her studies.
Several activists of the KSU, the students' wing of the opposition Congress in the state, marched towards the district collectorate in Kannur, demanding that additional plus-one batches be accommodated in schools.
When the protestors moved forward, raising slogans against Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan and General Education Minister V Sivankutty, police blocked their path by tying a rope in the middle of the road. As they continued the sloganeering and refused to leave the place, police used water canons twice.
The police also prevented the protestors from jumping across the barricade.
There was also a minor scuffle between the KSU activists and the law enforcers, who later forcibly removed the agitators, including women, from the area. Many female protestors could be seen being dragged on the road by the police.
The KSU activists alleged that they were also beaten up by the police.
There were tense moments during the KSU protests in Palakkad district as well.
While Congress party and the KSU have been demanding that additional plus-one seats be allotted in schools in the Malabar region to address the alleged shortage of seats there, the Kerala government has claimed that there is no crisis in plus-one admissions at all.
Minister V Sivankutty has claimed that thousands of seats remain vacant every year after plus-one admissions are completed in the region.
He has also claimed that, every year, temporary additional batches are permitted to ensure that students get to pick which stream of subjects they would like to study.
