Reservation Hatao Andolan protesters stay at Jantar Mantar, defying Delhi Police's venue shift orders

The Reservation Hatao Andolan (RHA) on Friday received permission from the Delhi Police for peaceful protests at the Ramlila Ground for up to 500 people till 4 PM.

However, this comes as protesters gathered in large numbers at Jantar Mantar—nearly 3km away—where the digital campaign based on the success of the Cockroach Janta Party (CJP) had originally planned to protest against caste-based reservation.

Apart from the key demand for a merit-based system for academic admissions and public employment, rather than caste quotas, the protesters have also proposed ending the requirement to declare caste details on public forms, job applications, and educational processes under a "One Nation, One Identity" framework.

They have also demanded that government assistance be based on factors like economic status, disability, orphan status, or being a child of a martyr—regardless of caste or religion. Local media reports claim that the protesters were also calling for rolling back the UGC's rules that were earlier stayed by the Supreme Court.

According to a PTI report citing police sources, some people had gathered at the protest site in the morning, but were immediately removed by the police, as no permission had been granted for holding a demonstration.

The Delhi Police had also rejected claims on Thursday that it had given permission for the RHA protest to be held at Jantar Mantar itself, calling them "false and misleading".

"No permission has been granted for any protest, procession, demonstration or assembly at Jantar Mantar," the Delhi Police had written in an X post on Thursday.

Notably, the RHA's Friday protest comes as prohibitory orders under Section 163 of the BNSS (erstwhile Section 144 of the CrPC) were already enforced at the iconic protest site. As a result, assemblies of five or more people are strictly prohibited.

Videos purportedly showing the protesters staying at the Jantar Mantar and chanting the Hanuman Chalisa have also gone viral on social media, with a few even indicating that they were not ready to move to the Ramlila Ground, despite heavy police deployment here.

"We are sitting at Jantar Mantar. We have asked for permission to protest here, and this is exactly where we want to be. And we will continue to sit here," an RHA activist wrote on X.

This has sparked concerns of whether the protest could turn violent, as in the case of the later CJP protests that saw a surge in protesters facing lathi charges and tear gassing by the Delhi Police—especially since they do not have permission to protest at Jantar Mantar, while their permission to do so at the Ramlila Ground expired at 4 PM.