Lord Ganesha in Bengaluru Police Van: As PM Modi, BJP, VHP Express Anguish, Here’s What Happened

Lord Ganesha, known as Vignaharta or the remover of obstacles, found himself in the eye of a storm when his idol was seated inside a police van alongside protesters in Bengaluru.

The image of the idol inside the vehicle, which had been assigned to transport arrested protesters gathered at Bengaluru’s Town Hall against the attack on a Ganesh Visarjan procession in Nagamangala has led to much chatter on social media. Bharatiya Janata Party and Vishva Hindu Parishad leaders have been posting on social media about how the deity was “also among those arrested”. Even Prime Minister Narendra Modi has spoken on the issue.

“In Congress-ruled Karnataka, even Ganpati is being put in jail,” he said at an election rally in Haryana.

So, what really happened? After the Nagamangala incident, which saw two communities clashing and led to arson, protests were planned across the state by right-wing groups condemning the attack and seeking an NIA probe into the matter. A protest was organised in the state capital by the Bengaluru Metropolitan Ganesh Utsav Committee at the city’s Town Hall area. They were denied permission by the police for the protest, yet a WhatsApp message was circulated asking people to gather at Town Hall as part of the protest. As per the rules in Bengaluru, the designated area for protests is Freedom Park. When the city police received information about plans for people to gather at Town Hall, two platoons of policemen were deployed.

Protesters started arriving in small groups, and by 11.30 am, there were close to 20 to 30 people gathered, raising slogans within the hour.

Since the protesters had gathered without prior police permission, cops began taking them into custody and moving them towards the parked police van. A senior police official, who did not want to be named, told News18 that a group of people who claimed they were taking a Ganesha idol for visarjan (immersion) joined the protest. They raised the Ganesha idol, which was around 1.55 feet tall, on their heads and began chanting slogans.

“The police had already started detaining the protesters, and on realising that the Ganesha idol was left on the ground, our officer quickly picked up the idol and put it in a safe place,” explained Bengaluru police commissioner B Dayananda to News18.

Photographs show an inspector taking the idol and placing it in an empty police van intended for the protesters. The sight of Lord Ganesha alone in the van caught the eye of photographers, and the image later went viral on social media. Later, the Ganesha idol was moved into a police jeep when the protesters were bundled into the van.

The BJP condemned the act of placing the idol inside a police van. BJP MP Tejasvi Surya voiced his strong disapproval on social media site X.

The police commissioner countered this, saying: “How could we leave Lord Ganesha unattended? Our officer ensured that the idol was taken safely, and since it was meant to be taken for visarjan, the visarjan was done in a local police station with all respect and devotion. The picture of Ganesha inside the van shows how we ensured the sanctity and respect of the idol, not otherwise.”

Forty people were arrested for participating in the protest, which had been carried out without permission from the police department.

Senior VHP leader Girish Bharadwaj called the incident “heartbreaking and unfortunate to see Lord Ganesha being taken away by police like a criminal”. He stated that it was a peaceful protest in Bengaluru against the intelligence failure of the police in Nagamangala.

“There seem to be restrictions on celebrating Hindu festivals. Why don’t they impose restrictions on other communities as well? In Nagamangala, the organisers were booked. Those who faced lathicharge for being part of a peaceful visarjan procession were booked. That was what the protest at Town Hall was about. Instead, they took away the Ganesha idol and placed it inside a Hoysala (police van). The way the photos show the police officers running with the idol, as if Ganesha himself were a criminal, was heart-wrenching,” Bharadwaj said.