Three people were killed in Mangalore and Lucknow districts and thousands detain across India on Thursday as authorities clamped down on protests against the Citizenship Amendment Act.
Two people were killed in Mangalore in Karnataka during clashes between the police and protestors and one died of firearm injury during violent protests in Lucknow.
In Mangalore, the victims, Abdul Jaleel, 49, and Nauseen Kudroli, 23, had suffered bullet injuries when police opened fire to quell the violent protests, reports The Week.
Quoting officials in a city hospital, Reuters reported that at least one of the two dead had been shot.
The incident took place as the protests turned violent with demonstrators hurling stones at police personnel leading to "lathi-charge" and firing.
Mangalore Police Commissioner PS Harsha said the police were forced to open fire after the situation turned volatile as the protesters started pelting stones, The Week reported.
Meanwhile, one person died of firearm injury during violent protests in Lucknow, reports The Week.
"Mohammad Wakeel, 25, died of firearm injury here [Lucknow]," King George's Medical University (KGMU) Trauma Centre in-charge Sandeep Tiwari told PTI.
"Two other patients are undergoing treatment in the trauma centre and one of them has firearm injury," he said.
Fresh protests, scores detained
Defying unprecedented prohibitory orders across regions, simultaneous protests broke out in multiple cities, prompting authorities to detain a large number of activists and students and clamp down on mobile services in parts of the national capital and other states.
Senior lawyer Prashant Bhushan, social activist Harsh Mander, scholar Yogendra Yadav, and left leaders Sitaram Yechury and D Raja were among the 1,200 detained in Delhi near the Red Fort and Mandi House, reports Scroll.in.
In Bengaluru, historian and intellectual Ramachandra Guha and over 200 people, including many professors, were detained by the police but this did not protestors from marching to the city’s Town Hall.
"I am protesting non-violently, but look, they are stopping us," Guha told Reuters.
Police said they had detained around 200 people in the city, where protest organizers said thousands attended four demonstrations yesterday.
Prohibitory orders banning large gatherings are in place in Uttar Pradesh and Karnataka – both of which have the Bharatiya Janata Party in power. Internet services were suspended in Uttar Pradesh’s Sambhal district, where a state-run bus was set ablaze.
There were reports of demonstrations in other parts of the country as well. Police baton-charged protestors in Ahmedabad. Several demonstrators, most of them university students, were detained in Hyderabad on their way to Exhibition Grounds, where a demonstration was planned
One student loses eye
Police fired tear gas and water cannon at several thousand protestors in state capital Lucknow while in Modi's home state of Gujarat, police said they baton-charged demonstrators and arrested 50 people.
Security forces in the capital have fired some 450 tear gas shells in the past five days, the Hindustan Times daily reported. One student reportedly lost an eye.
In the northeast, where the protests began last week – albeit for different reasons – around 20,000 people took to the streets in different locations. No violence was reported, however, after last week's deadly clashes, reports AFP.
Peaceful protests in Mumbai and Kolkata
In sharp contrast, Kolkata and Mumbai saw large peaceful protests. Both the cities are part of states that are ruled by non-BJP parties which are opposed to the Citizenship Act.
But the day's biggest demonstration so far took place in Malegaon in Maharashtra state – no assembly ban was in place – with as many as 60,000 people, police said.
In Mumbai, a crowd of thousands including tattooed students and older Muslim men wearing skullcaps brandished Indian flags, posters of Mahatma Gandhi and handed out copies of the constitution.
"We cannot stay silent or on the fringes anymore. We have to act now," financial advisor Aman Verma told AFP.
"Something has changed. This is the first time in a long time that people in Mumbai have come out in such large numbers to register dissent," said consultant Karishma V.
The crowd in Kolkata was estimated at more than 40,000.