Many of the people attending Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s events in Pune on Sunday were asked to remove their black masks by the police personnel on duty. Even those wearing black clothes were stopped while entering these venues.
Modi inaugurated various projects, including the 12-kilometre stretch of Pune Metro, the R K Laxman Art Gallery. He also laid the foundation stone for a riverfront development project and a Rs 1,100-crore project for the Mula Mutha river. The Prime Minister inaugurated these from the stage at the MIT campus in Kothrud where he also addressed a large gathering.
Later, he inaugurated the Symbiosis Arogya Dham campus of the Symbiosis International University premises in Lavale. People, including reporters covering the events at both MIT Campus and Symbiosis Campus, had to face police on duty asking them to take off their black masks. They were also asked if they were carrying any black handkerchieves.
However, no prior instructions or public directives were issued by any authority against wearing black clothing or masks to these programmes. Pune Police Commissioner Amitabh Gupta said, “The directives to on-duty personnel were only about black flags and not any other clothing items or masks.”
Abhinav Deshmukh, SP for Pune Rural jurisdiction under which the Lavale campus falls, said, “We were not allowing black flags. But it is possible that some on-duty cops asked people about their black clothing. We will look into it.”