Inside Delhi's makeshift detention centres: former Kerala CM, content creators, actor and journalists

Former Kerala Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan. Actor Raj Zutshi. Social media content creators filming reels. Fifteen journalists covering the protest. And a middle-aged man who said he was taking a relative to the hospital when the police stopped him in central Delhi.

They were among hundreds of people picked up by the Delhi Police and transported in buses and vans to makeshift detention centres across the capital ahead of the Cockroach Janta Party's October 10 protest at Jantar Mantar. The police set up these centres across all 13 districts, including Chhatrasal Stadium in north Delhi, about 13 kilometres from Jantar Mantar, and Rajiv Gandhi Stadium in Bawana, around 38 kilometres from the protest site.

At Chhatrasal Stadium around noon, everyday activities at the sports complex continued alongside the detention operation. Athletes were still practising as police buses brought in detainees. Near the entrance, a large pavilion tent was being prepared to provide meals, drinking water and refreshments to police officers and Central Armed Police Forces personnel deployed at the site.

Inside the complex, police vehicles stopped near the arena while officers collected details from detainees. Sources said Pinarayi Vijayan had been detained that morning near Kerala House, on Jantar Mantar Road, and was inside the stadium complex.

AR Sindhu, a CPI(M) party worker, spoke from inside a police vehicle carrying detainees. She alleged that women protesters' clothes were being torn and said the police appeared uncertain about where to take the group next.

"Women's clothes are being torn... the police don't know where to take us. Abhi hamein Burari leke jayenge," she said, meaning that they would now be taken to Burari.

Sindhu said the group had been moved repeatedly since being detained.

"This is the third place where we have been mistreated. Since we were detained, they have been taking us around from one place to another. This is the second place they have brought us to, and now they are telling us to leave from here as well," she alleged.

The movement of detainees continued through the morning. Around half a dozen people had arrived at the stadium before 11 a.m., but the same group was later seen leaving in a Delhi Police bus. Actor Raj Zutshi was among four or five detainees in a van that departed the complex.

Another bus soon arrived, its occupants chanting, "Vote chor, gaddi chor!" and "Inquilab zindabad!"

Around noon, another group said they had been picked up at New Delhi Railway Station and Chelmsford Road, in central Delhi. Fifteen journalists covering the protest were subsequently brought to the stadium. Newslaundry journalist Anmol Pritam said that 15 journalists had been detained.

Pritam said, "While we were reporting, all journalists were detained. Four of us were reporting at the New Delhi railway station together. They picked us up from there and brought us here in this bus."

Inside the same bus, another detainee shouted that their phones had been taken away.

A further bus carrying protesters entered the complex later, marking the seventh major vehicle carrying detainees to the venue since the police action began that morning. The group was taken to a government school in Shalimar Bagh that was also being used as a detention centre.

At Rajiv Gandhi Stadium in Bawana, the athletic area had been cordoned off to accommodate detainees. Police personnel at the site said 17 men had been brought there by 11 a.m.

One of them, a middle-aged man, said he had no connection to the protest and had been picked up on Mahadev Road while taking a relative to the hospital.

"I have nothing to do with the protest. They picked me up from Mahadev Road (Central Delhi), asking me why I was there, when I was taking a relative to the hospital," he said from inside a police bus.

Two social media content creators seated behind him said they had been detained while making reels near Jantar Mantar. Inside the stadium, a police officer could be seen telling a young detainee not to smoke.