Excelsior Correspondent
JAMMU, Mar 14: Over 300 BJP activists including senior leaders and MLAs today courted arrest as police foiled their ‘Secretariat gherao’ march in this winter capital of Jammu and Kashmir.
About 1,000 BJP workers led by State President Jugal Kishore Sharma this afternoon assembled outside the Press Club Jammu amid anti-government slogans and marched towards the Civil Secretariat to gherao State Assembly
Carrying placards and banners, the protesters after covering the main bazaars reached Indira Chowk where the heavy deployment of police restricted their movement and did not allow them to proceed.
The demonstrators forcibly tried to move ahead following they clashed with the police.
District Administration has already imposed Section 144 CRPC around the Legislative Assembly.
Despite being stopped from moving towards the Secretariat Complex, the activists made attempts to move ahead but police resorted to lathi-charge to disperse them.
The BJP activists including women jumped over the barricades and reached near the Legislative Assembly but they were court arrested.
Around two dozen activists also received injuries in the clashes and lathi-charge.
Over 300 protesters including locals MLAs were court arrested and shifted to the district police lines.
Addressing the party activists Jugal Kishore Sharma said that Omar Abdullah led Coalition Government in the State has been speaking in favour of Afzal Guru in Assembly and outside by calling him Sahib while they have no sympathy or pain for the patriotic personnel of Army and para military forces who are falling in line of their duty at the hands of terrorists.
He said the administration has been ineffective and corruption is crossing the limits under this Government. The NC has been using all the time to please the separatists and the Congress is maintaining a stoic silence which is very dangerous for the State and the country, he added.
Besides Jugal Kishore Sharma the other BJP leaders who were arrested near Civil Secretariat included BJP Legislative Party leader Ashok Khajuria, MLAs, Ch Sukhnandan and Shyam Choudhary, National Executive Member and Chief spokesperson, Dr Jitendra Singh, State vice president Chander Parkash Ganga, State general secretaries, Kavinder Gutpa and Rajiv Jasrotia, Amarnath Gupta, Yudhvir Sethi, Mohan Singh Chouhan, Ravinder Raina, Priya Sethi, Surinder Bahgat and Rajesh Gupta.
The Party activists who were injured in lathi charge included Col (retd) Uttam Singh, Shyam Choudhary, Yudhvir Sethi, Munish Sharma, Ashok Kumar, Ravinder Raina, Ayodhya Gupta, Narotam Sharma, Vijay Choudhary, Mohan Singh Rana, Sanjay Baru, Ashwani Sharma, Ajay Vaid, Priya Jral, Manju Dogra, Sudershan Tirlochan, Parveen Arora, Rajni Sethi, B S Jasrotia, Ishan Thappa, Jeet Angral, Mukesh Sharma and Rakesh Mishra.
BJP had organised State-wide protests at all district and tehsil levels today against corruption, mis-governance in Jammu and Kashmir besides failure of National-Conference-Congress led Government on all fronts.
At Basholi former Punjab Minister Master Mohan Lal along with Dr Nirmal Singh, Mamta Singh and Ved Mankotia led the 200 party activists dharna outside office of SDM at Basholi. Dr Nirmal Singh on the occasion criticized the SDM for leaving the office intentionally.
At Kathua former BJP president Shamsher Singh Manhas, Vijay Sharma and Ranjit Singh held protest outside the DC Office and took out a procession in the town. At Ramban the protest was led by Bansi Lal Bharti, Arun Chibber, Ghulam Ali Khatana and Vijay Thakur. Sunil Sharma and Rajinder Singh led the protest at Kishtwar.
At Udhampur Pawan Gupta, Pawan Khajuria, State secretary and Dina Nath Bhagat led the protest. A rally was also taken from BJP office to DC Office in protest against the failure of State Government on all fronts and its pro- separatist policies.
At Reasi N D Rajwal and Ajay Nanda led the protest while at Poonch the protest was led by Sunil Gupta.
At Rajouri a protest rally was taken from Gujjar Mandi to DC Office. The protestors with flags and banners in their hands were raising slogans against the Government. The protest rally was led by BJP State secretary Vivodh Gupta and Bharat Bushan. The protestors also submitted a memorandum at DC Office.
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