Delhi Police’s October 10 protest test: Police lawfully police, don’t police dissent

Delhi Police has reportedly launched a localised ‘outreach’ campaign to ‘discourage’ public participation in the scheduled Oct 10 Jantar Mantar demonstration announced by CJP and Left organisations, demanding CEC Gyanesh Kumar’s removal and suspension of SIR.

After denying permission for the protest gathering, police are now meeting guesthouse owners, RWAs and market associations, asking them to dissuade potential protesters. The job of the police is to maintain law and order, not to pre-emptively conflate the act of protesting with the breach of law and order. Article 19(1)(b) guarantees citizens the right to assemble peacefully and without arms, subject to reasonable restrictions.

Supreme Court has repeatedly recognised this as a legitimate means of expressing grievances, while allowing restrictions to protect public order. Delhi Police should concentrate on ensuring professional policing. Surveillance, drones, CCTV and body cameras can help establish who breached the law and who did not.


Those who break the law should be held individually accountable. Peaceful, but loud, protesters should not be treated as suspects by association. Protesters, too, must obey lawful restrictions —not merely as legal obligation, but because disciplined, peaceful action gives a protest greater tactical potency. Both sides must remain alert to agent provocateurs, individuals who may infiltrate to deliberately encourage unlawful acts.

On Oct 10, the test should be simple: protect peaceful assembly, prevent violence and deal firmly with actual lawbreakers. But using official machinery to ‘ask’ citizens to stay away from a designated protest site, and not exercise a constitutional right, is blatant overreach and misuse of state power.