At midnight on Monday, there was a lot of commotion in Kothamangalam town when Mohammed Shiyas, the head of the Ernakulam district Congress Committee, and Mathew Kuzhalnadan, MLA, were taken into custody by the police.
Together with colleague lawmaker Eldhose Kunnappillil, Mr. Kuzhalnadan was on an indefinite hunger strike at the Post Office Junction in Kothamangalam town, where they were calling for a long-term solution to the problems between humans and animals throughout the State. Mr. Kuzhalnadan was taken into custody at this location.
Senior Congress politician Ramesh Chennithala, who had earlier started the hunger strike, resisted attempts to arrest Mr. Kunnappillil. Congress sources claimed that once the police had placed him in a patrol car, Mr. Chennithala was able to secure his release.
A video of Mr. Shiyas’s arrest, which was more dramatic, has recently surfaced. In the video, Mr. Shiyas was shown being taken away in a lockdown reminiscent to a wrestling match by a plainclothes police officer and a group of uniformed police officers from behind a store close to the protest site, where he had gone to get refreshments. There weren’t many partygoers with him at the time who could have resisted the police’s action, so the arrest came as a surprise.
