Social activist Trupti Desai and more than a dozen members of her outfit Bhumata Brigade were briefly detained in Maharashtra’s Ahmednagar district on Thursday. The group was on its way to Shirdi’s Saibaba temple to protest against the “dress code” boards set up outside the premises.
Desai was prohibited from entering the temple town till December 11 after she announced her protest.
The protestors had decided to remove the boards displayed outside the temple, asking visitors to be dressed in a “civilised” way or according to “Indian culture”. The group was taken into custody near Supa village of the district.
“We released all the activists on Thursday evening and escorted them back till the Pune district border,” Ahmednagar Superintendent of Police Manoj Patil told PTI.
On Tuesday, Sub-divisional Magistrate (Shirdi area) Govind Shinde had sent Desai a notice, asking her not to enter the temple town from midnight of December 8 till December 11.
Meanwhile, an unidentified official of the Saibaba temple trust said the boards were put up after they received complaints from some of the visitors. Another senior official of the trust, however, clarified they had not imposed a dress code, and that the message was only an appeal.
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