Former IAS officer Kannan Gopinathan, who was en route to attend an anti-citizenship law protest at Aligarh Muslim University, has been detained at UP border on Saturday. Gopinathan was scheduled to speak at the AMU protest on Saturday. "Detained at UP border...," Gopinathan took to Twitter to inform about his detention. He also shared an image of the detention order. However, Gopinathan noted that the "the order shared is for Aligarh district", while he was "being detained in Agra".
Gopinathan has been leading anti-citizenship protests across the country. On Friday, he had tweeted that the Aligarh district administration had asked him not to attend the AMU protest. "Got a call from Aligarh District administration asking me not to come for the event. That they got direction from state govt to not let the event happen and to prevent my entry into district. I will be going to Aligarh. Administration is free to do as they deem fit," he tweeted on Friday.
Gopinathan, who was the Power Secretary in the Union Territories of Daman and Diu and Dadra & Nagar Haveli, had resigned from service to protest against the restrictions imposed in Jammu and Kashmir following the abrogation of Article 370.
This is the second time Gopinathan has been detained for participating in anti-CAA protests. On December 13, he was detained and released soon during an agitation against the Citizenship Amendment Act in Mumbai.