The police on Sunday allegedly stopped a youth from purchasing medicine for his ailing child from a medical shop at Kalady in Kochi citing that Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan's convoy would pass through the road.
The incident has aggravated people's resentment over the traffic restrictions being imposed on them for the Chief Minister's movement.
According to Kottayam native Sarath, he was returning from Kochi airport when his four-year-old son developed fever. When he tried to stop the vehicle near a medical shop at Kadaly, a policeman asked him not to do so.
Sarath travelled some more distance and since no medical shop could be spotted, he returned and parked the car at a nearby area and walked to the medical shop. He and the medical shop owner told the police about the difficulty they had to face. The police officer in the Sub-Inspector rank shouted at them and threatened that the medical shop would be shut.
The Opposition Congress flayed the incident and accused the Chief Minister of deploying heavy police bandobast for his travel.
The Chief Minister's security was beefed up in view of the Opposition's protests against price hike proposals in the Budget. The Opposition workers had been waving black flags at the Chief Minister at various places in the last few days.
Published 14 February 2023, 15:03 IST