Congress workers protest outside Kokrajhar police station against Jignesh Mevani's arrest

A day after a court in Assam's Kokrajhar district sent Gujarat MLA Jignesh Mevani to police custody, the Congress workers on Friday staged a demonstration outside Kokrajhar police station, where the Dalit leader was being held. The protest comes as the party workers opposed Mevani's 'illegal arrest' and are demanding his immediate release. The protesting Congress workers raised slogans against the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) government and Prime Minister Narendra Modi. 

Gujarat MLA Jignesh Mevani arrested for a tweet against PM Modi

Jignesh Mevani, who is an independent MLA supported by the Congress, was apprehended from Palanpur town in Gujarat on Wednesday night after a First Information Report (FIR) under various sections of the Indian Penal Code (IPC) and the IT Act- Section 120(B), 153 (A), 295(A), 450, 504, 505, (B), (C) of IPC and Section 66 of IT Act, was filed against him in Kokrajhar police station over his purported tweet against PM Modi. Some of the sections are non-bailable offences. The complaint has alleged that the tweets posted by MLA Mevani are offensive to PM Modi and tend to incite communal violence. 

Mevani was flown to Guwahati from Gujarat on Thursday morning and was subsequently taken to Kokrajhar by road, where he was produced at the Chief Judicial Magistrate's Court, which remanded him in three days' police custody. Assam Pradesh Congress Committee (APCC) President and MLA Jakir Hussain Sikdar is leading the protest and has claimed that Mevani had been arrested to "thwart his influence" in Gujarat. 

'Truth can't be crushed to imprison dissent': Rahul Gandhi on Mevani's arrest

Congress leader Rahul Gandhi, reacting to Mevani's arrest, claimed that "truth cannot be crushed to imprison dissent." Sharing a news article on Mevani's arrest, Gandhi tweeted, "Modi ji, you can try to crush dissent by abusing the state machinery. But you can never imprison the truth." Further slamming the police's action against the Congress MLA, Rahul Gandhi termed the arrest as 'undemocratic' and 'unconstitutional'.

Congress spokesperson Manish Doshi qualified the tweet as a normal request by Mevani, by saying that he made an appeal to PM Modi for peace. He said, "Jignesh Mevani is an MLA, and it's normal for him to appeal for peace before the Prime Minister when there were communal clashes in Khambhat, Himmatnagar and Veraval in Gujarat, which is the home state of the PM. To arrest somebody overnight as if the person is a terrorist or a history-sheeter is a gross misuse of the rights provided by the Constitution. We will fight a legal battle and we are confident of winning it."