Bengaluru: The Sixth Additional Chief Metropolitan Magistrate court on Saturday directed SJ Park police to probe and take appropriate action against those planning to organise ‘Kiss of Love’ event in Bengaluru on Sunday.
The organisers, who had said that they will go ahead with the campaign defying city police permission, have claimed that they have postponed the event and would make necessary changes and table a concrete plan before the city police prior to hosting the event.
The organisers of the Bengaluru chapter have submitted a letter to City Police Commissioner M.N. Reddi which stated that they would discuss the matter with NGOs and will decide on the mode of protest.
Mr Reddi said, “The police will never oppose the event if it takes place within the legal framework. We will go through the letter submitted by the organisers and take a suitable decision.”
The sixth ACMM Court, hearing a petition filed by the Sri Ram Sena, senior advocate Amruthesh and a few others, directed the police to investigate the matter and take action against the organisers – Rachitha Taneja and Vijayan Kallin.
The judge said that it was wrong on the part of organisers to hold the event despite rejection by the police and directed the police to submit a detailed report if the event took place and the action taken by them by December 3.
Clarifying their stand and issuing a detailed report to the city police, the organisers in their press release stated “We have now issued a detailed reply to the police which clearly outlines our intention behind organising the event. We have stated that the intention is not to create a spectacle, nor to engage in any obscene acts and certainly not to create any public nuisance. We have asserted our right to engage in a peaceful protest and to use the “Kiss of love” event to bring to attention the dangers of rising moral policing in the country and in Karnataka.
The press release said, “We believe that the ‘Kiss of Love’ is protected under Art. 19(1)(a) of the constitution which guaranteed freedom of speech and expression and it is legally wrong to presume that an act is obscene without seeing it in the larger context of the meaning behind the act.
We have alerted the police to a number of judicial precedents that exist on the point, and we hope that they will reconsider their decision so that we can proceed with the event at a different date, as well as guaranteeing that there are no disruptions,” said the organisers of ‘Kiss of Love’.
