Protests as toll collection begins on newly opened Bengaluru-Mysuru highway
Ramanagara, Mar 14: Two days after Prime Minister Narendra Modi inaugurated the Bengaluru-Mysuru Expressway, several outfits staged protests at a toll plaza near here on Tuesday, opposing the National Highways Authority of India's (NHAI) decision to levy charges without proper service roads and passes for local residents.
Opposition Congress workers too joined the protesters and held demonstrations.
The protesters are opposed to collecting toll fees until the entire project is completed. They have also expressed reservations regarding service roads not being built, and the toll rate fixed being too high.
Amid heavy presence of police personnel, protesters shouted slogans demanding justice and also criticised the government, while some even threatened to destroy the toll plaza altogether. Several protesters were detained by the police.
Being the first day of toll collection, some technical glitches also added to the chaos, making commuters wait for a long time, due to congestion.
Many cab drivers, who commute on the stretch daily, hit out at NHAI authorities for mismanagement, charging high toll fees for short distances, and no proper service road.
"I'm going for 20 kilometres on this stretch, for which I have to pay Rs 147, where should we go? If there was a proper service road, I wouldn't have come here, how should I go?" a taxi driver asked.
Another car driver heading towards Ramanagara, alleged that locals have not been issued any passes. "This is not right, locals are facing the problems."
Speaking in Bengaluru, Karnataka Congress President D K Shivakumar said it was not right for the Prime Minister to have inaugurated the Expressway, without the completion of the project and having no proper service roads to help local residents.
"It was done for the sake of politics ahead of elections and not for the sake of people," he asserted.
Later in the evening, Shivakumar tweeted: "I have seen on TV and newspapers since morning about people expressing outrage near the toll centre on the Bengaluru-Mysuru Expressway. Today, I too had an experience while travelling from Bidadi to Ramanagara. To go from Bidadi to Ramanagara, I had to pay a toll of Rs 135, they have charged Rs 270 in the pretext of a problem with the FASTag scanner."
On March 12, Prime Minister Modi inaugurated the 118-km Bengaluru-Mysuru Expressway project here. It will reduce the travel time between Bengaluru and Mysuru from around three hours to about 75 minutes, according to officials.
The Rs 8,480 crore project involved six-laning of the Bengaluru-Nidaghatta-Mysuru section of NH-275, and will act as a catalyst for socio-economic development in the region, they said.
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'Traitor' jibe: HC issues notice to police, Sena MLA on Kamra's plea against FIR
Mumbai (PTI): The Bombay High Court on Tuesday issued a notice to Mumbai police and Shiv Sena MLA Murji Patel on comedian Kunal Kamra's plea challenging an FIR lodged against him for allegedly passing a "traitor" jibe at Maharashtra Deputy Chief Minister Eknath Shinde.
A division bench of Justices Sarang Kotwal and S M Modak said it would hear Kamra's petition on April 16.
The comedian has failed to appear before the Mumbai police for questioning despite three summons issued to him.
Following a complaint by Sena MLA Murji Patel, the Khar police in Mumbai last month registered the FIR against Kamra under Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita sections 353(1)(b) (statements conducing to public mischief) and 356(2) (defamation).
"Issue notice to the respondents (police and Patel). They shall take instructions and respond to the plea," the HC said.
Three FIRs registered against the comedian at Nashik Rural, Jalgaon and Nashik (Nandgaon) have also been transferred to the Khar police.
Kamra's counsel Navroz Seervai informed the Bombay HC bench that the Madras High Court on Monday extended till April 17 the earlier interim transit anticipatory bail granted to the comedian.
The petitioner has offered in writing thrice to the police to allow him to appear for questioning via video conference in light of the dangers and threat to his life, Seervai said.
"It seems that the police authorities are not so keen on recording his statement but more on bringing him here physically," the senior counsel claimed.
Kamra is presently in Tamil Nadu where he has been residing since 2021, as per his plea.
"This is not a case of murder. It is an FIR that has stemmed from a stand-up comedy show. He (Kamra) is ready to cooperate with the probe but through video conference," Seervai said.
The bench said it would consider all issues on April 16.
During the show, stand-up comedian Kamra had taunted Shinde, without taking his name, using a modified version of a Hindi song from the film "Dil To Pagal Hai" where he called him a "gaddar" (traitor).
The comedian went on to joke about how Shinde rebelled against Uddhav Thackeray's leadership (in June 2022).
In his plea filed on April 5, Kamra claimed the complaints against him were violative of his fundamental rights of freedom of speech and expression, right to practice any profession and business and right to life and liberty guaranteed under the Constitution of India.
He sought for the FIR to be quashed, claiming the allegations, even if taken at face value, do not constitute an offence.
The comedian also sought the HC to protect him from any coercive action including arrest, seizure of his personal electronic devices and examination of his financial transactions and accounts.
"To permit the investigation to continue would constitute a frontal assault on the freedom of speech and expression. Should a citizen's right to comment on the political developments and actions of political leaders be criminalised in this manner?" the petition said.
Kamra said his remarks made regarding the split in the Shiv Sena, Shinde quitting Uddhav Thackeray's Sena faction and being sworn in as the chief minister at the time (in 2022) are all part of records.
The plea said the FIR has been registered on a stand-up comedy performance, which provides satirical commentary on various social and political events of the country.
There has been a gross abuse of process and the malafide deployment of the criminal justice machinery by a member of the state's legislative assembly, resulting in a patent violation of a citizen's fundamental rights, it claimed.
As per the petition, Kamra wrote the show's script in July 2024 and performed it on 60 occasions between August last year and February 2025.
A recording of the show was uploaded only in March 2025, pursuant to which case was lodged, it said.
