Capital traffic screeches to a halt

Monday saw massive traffic snarls in Central Delhi spiralling to other parts of the national Capital as hundreds of Dalit protesters took to the streets against the alleged dilution of the SC/ST Act.

Police said demonstrators had gathered at Mandi House protesting against the Supreme Court’s order banning automatic arrest and registration of cases for alleged harassment of Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes.

A senior traffic official said around 2,500 protesters blocked road outside the Mandi House Metro Station, bringing traffic to a halt for commuters heading towards ITO and other stretches. The official said the protesters also blocked one of the carriageways of the Barakhamba Road crippling the traffic on the stretch. The city police also curtailed the traffic movement on Sansad Marg from Patel Chowk to Jantar Mantar.

Police said in light of the protests, no untoward incident took place in Delhi.

The protests were held by several Dalit organisations who had called for a ‘Bharat Bandh’ across the country on Monday.

The Supreme Court had on March 20 diluted certain provisions of the SC/ST Prevention of Atrocities Act, in a bid to protect ‘honest’ public servants discharging bona fide duties from being blackmailed with false cases under the Act. The verdict is being widely criticised by the Dalits and the Opposition who claim that the dilution of the Act will lead to more discrimination and crime against the backward community.

Police said there is no report of any untoward incident in Delhi, even as protests in other States turned violent. Taking no chances, the Delhi Police had deployed additional force between Mandi House and Parliament Street since it was anticipated that the protesters would march towards Parliament.

Police said in other areas of Delhi, the respective Deputy Commissioners of Police, Assistant Commissioners of Police, SHOs were out in the field to ensure that peace is maintained.

Protesters blocked the road outside the metro station there, bringing traffic to a halt and inconveniencing  commuters travelling towards ITO and other stretches. Slogans of ‘Jai Bhim’ filled the air as the protesters blocked one of the carriageways of Barakhamba Road affecting traffic on the stretch.

Traffic was also affected in the Connaught Place’s outer circle as protesters squatted on the road. Police had closed the traffic movement on Sansad Marg from Patel Chowk to Jantar Mantar.

Protesters squatted on tracks in several places outside Delhi, stopping trains, including the Dehradun Express and the Ranchi Rajdhani, officials said.

Services were disrupted when a mob arrived at the Ghaziabad yard around 10 am on Monday, Northern Railway officials said.

Many trains, such as Saptakranti Express, Utkal Express and the Bhubaneswar and Ranchi Rajdhani as well as the Kanpur Shatabdi, were stopped ahead of Ghaziabad in Meerut and Modinagar, officials said.

A mob of about 2,000 people disrupted trains at the Hapur station as well, disrupting the movement of many goods trains, they added.

The Delhi Police and Railway Protection Force personnel have been working to get people off the tracks.  In some areas, operations have been restored, the officials said.