Mangaluru : District congress committee staged a protest here at the DC office on Wednesday, September 4, against the arrest of former minister and state Congress leader D K Shivakumar by Enforcement Directorate (ED).

Addressing the protestors, former MLA J R Lobo said, “We condemn the arrest of D K Shivakumar. Enforcement directorate is harassing Shivakumar for the last four days. Though D K Shivakumar co-operated with the ED, they have claimed that Shivakumar has not responded to their queries and stated that as a reason for the arrest.”

Former minister Ramanath Rai said, “Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Amit Shah are playing hate politics and targeting opposition leaders one by one. In order to hide the failure of the government, the BJP are targeting Congress leaders and getting them arrested. When Yediyurappa was involved in horse trading, these departments were silent and did not show any kind of interest in conducting an enquiry.”

Congress leaders raised slogans against BJP government and also in favour of D K Shivakumar.

Meanwhile Congress leaders burnt effigy of Narendra Modi and Amit Shah. When Congress leaders tried to block the road, police arrested the protesting leaders. Traffic was affected for a while in the wake of the protest.

MLC Ivan D’Souza, district Congress president Harish Kumar, former MLA Shakuntala Shetty, Abhayachandra Jain and others were present.