New Delhi: Will Delhiites be a more daring to kiss and show it? Kiss Of Love, a Facebook campaign, will be held in the national capital on Saturday after a lukewarm response to the event in Kochi, Kolkata, Hyderabad and Mumbai.
According to the movement’s Facebook page, the event outside the office of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) in Jhandewalan near the Metro station will display “embraces, holds and kisses”.
“Come embrace, hold, shake hands, give high fives… and Kiss. They take away our cafes, our pubs, our parks, our galis and mohallas and tell us this is no place to kiss. Let’s go to Jhandewala where the grand office of Rashtriya Swayam Sangh is located and register our protest,” said a post on Facebook.
Pankhuri Zaheer and two Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU) students Sumitran Basu and Pratik are organising the Delhi chapter of the event.
The organisers say they selected the venue near the RSS office because the right wing group has been denying them public spaces to express their affection.
Out of the 8,500 people invited to the event, at least 1,100 people have confirmed their participation on the campaign’s Facebook page.
The movement began when activists from all over Kerala decided to protest against alleged moral policing by right-wing groups by organising a mass-kissing campaign on November 2.
The campaign was launched on social media after a coffee shop in north Kerala’s Kozhikode city was vandalised by a group of people who criticised the public display of affection by some couples there.
The attack came after a news channel owned by a political party carried a report on October 23 with visuals of “immoral activities” allegedly taking place at the establishment, showing young couples kissing and embracing.
The much-hyped campaign fizzled out after the police rounded up 50-odd activists, who were planning to march towards Kochi’s Marine Drive, the venue of the event.
The event which saw a very few participants in Kolkata and Mumbai passed off peacefully. In Hyderabad, pro-Hindu groups tried to stop the protestors. The city police also registered cases against the participants in the event.
