Bengaluru has over 7,000 rowdy-sheeters: Govt

There are 7,526 rowdies, whose names are on sheets maintained by the police, Home Minister Araga Jnanendra has said in a written reply to the Legislative Council.

Notably, the police have dropped 788 rowdies from these rowdy-sheets since 2020. Jnanendra said this in response to a question raised by Congress’ U B Venkatesh.

According to data tabled by the minister, the Bengaluru police removed 334 rowdies from their sheets in 2020, 188 in 2021 and 266 this year.

The highest number of ‘deletions’ was in the Northeast police division, where 293 rowdies no longer feature in sheets maintained in police stations at Yelahanka, Kodigehalli, Vidyaranyapura, Sampigehalli, Kothanur, Bagalur, Amruthahalli, Devanahalli, international airport and Chikkajala.

A rowdy sheet is an internal document to monitor activities of offenders.

Under the Karnataka Police Manual, a Register of Rowdy is maintained on offenders classified under A, B and C categories. The first one comprises notorious, habitual offenders. Second category is for the moderately notorious and the third for first-time offenders perceived to be a threat to society. Cops regularly summon them to police stations and record their antecedents.

A rowdy can be deleted from the sheets on six grounds. “Those who do not participate in any crime or rowdy activities for ten years, those who are not convicted in any case, rowdies against whom no trial is underway before a court, those who are above 60 years of age, those suffering from prolonged ill health and those who demonstrate good behaviour can be removed from the rowdy-sheets,” Jnanendra said.

Venkatesh told DH that he raised the question because rowdies were in the news recently after some of them were seen with BJP leaders in public events.

The Congress has flayed the BJP of having started a ‘Rowdy Morcha’. This, after BJP MPs P C Mohan, Tejasvi Surya, MLA Uday Garudachar and others shared the stage at a public event with rowdy-sheeter ‘Silent’ Sunila. The also BJP inducted Mallikarjun aka ‘Fighter’ Ravi, a rowdy-sheeter from Nagamangala. At Anekal, the BJP reportedly nominated rowdy-sheeter Manjunath aka Uppi to the Anekal Town Municipal Council. The likes of ‘Onte’ Rohith, Wilson Garden Naga and Bettanagere Shankara were also seen hobnobbing with BJP leaders.

The BJP has hit back by saying Karnataka Congress president D K Shivakumar was once groomed by gangster Kotwal Ramachandra. It has also raked up ‘criminal antecedents’ of former minister Vinay Kulkarni and Youth Congress chief Mohammed Nalapad.