Kerala gets cold feet: 'Kiss of Love' protest fizzles out, 50 protesters arrested

Kochi: Organisers and sympathisers of the controversial ‘Kiss of Love’ event were today taken into custody as they tried to march to the Marine Drive grounds, venue of the symbolic protest against moral policing, police said. The organisers tried to take out a march from Ernakulam Law college to the venue, but were prevented from doing so. About 50 persons were taken into custody, they said. Holding placards and raising slogans against moral policing, the protestors were bundled into a police van. [caption id=“attachment_1784097” align=“alignleft” width=“380”]  Kiss Fest ion Kochi. Image courtesy ibnlive[/caption] A strong police contingent was posted at the Marine Drive Grounds to keep a lookout for potential trouble makers. The organisers had expected nearly 1,000 people to turn up for the event, but the media hype generated saw the area overflowing with people, curious to see the unique protest and those against the event. In a last minute change, the organisers tried to take out a march from the Ernakulam law college at around 4.30 pm to reach the Marine Drive grounds, when they were stopped by police and taken into custody. The programme scheduled earlier was that the event would be held at the grounds at 5 pm. Holding placards and banners, those against the ‘Kiss Fest’, including Shiv Sena, district unit of Kerala Students Union and a Muslim outfit took out marches against the event, organised by ‘Free Thinkers’, a group of social networking website Facebook users against a moral policing incident at Kozhikode. According to The Indian Express, several organisations got together to protest against the ‘Kiss of Love’ event. Some of the organisations even labelled the event as an instance of ’love jihad’. The paper reported that banners have come up in Kochi declaring the ‘Kiss of Love’ protest as a new form of ’love jihad’. IE reported: “Others on the Hindu side were activists of Yuva Morcha, ABVP and Bajrang Dal, while Muslim side had activists of conservative Sunni youth outfit SYS and rightwing Muslim political party Social Democratic Party of India.” DNA reported that many of the participants in the protest failed to kiss and a few who did manage to lock lips were rounded up. Some of them then kissed inside police vans and at the police station in a mark of protest. The DNA report states, “The police made several lathicharges and used pepper spray to disperse the mob. Several bystanders, including mediapersons, suffered minor injuries in the lathicharge. Finally, normalcy was restored in Marine Drive by dusk.” The Facebook page of the campaign, which has over 70,000 likes, now has a cover picture protesting the police action against the ‘Kiss of Love’ participants. It says, “Attackers are safe, victims are locked up.” However, the page became unsearchable and disappeared today morning - it is not clear if it has been pulled down by the authorities or the organisers themselves. The district unit of Kerala Students Union took out a march to the high court and held a cultural gathering against moral policing, which was addressed by writer M Leelavthy. The organisers had clarified yesterday that the event was “not a kiss fest” but a gathering of like minded people to raise awareness against moral policing and that they would next focus on creating awareness about AIDS. Rahul Pasupalan, IT professional and short film maker and his wife were among those taken into custody. Police also chased away the large gathering of youngsters at the Marine Drive grounds. People ran helter-skelter and some fell down in the melee. A cameraman of a television channel was injured. Thousands had gathered at the venue from various parts of the state since afternoon to witness the event. With inputs from PTI