Thiruvananthapuram: A school student staged a protest after police erected a barricade on the road leading to his house, cutting off his access. The delay in removing the barricade — even after a Cliff House march staged by the BJP had ended — prompted the child’s protest.

“I am feeling thirsty. Either you remove the barricade or give me some water,” demanded the student, according to Petta Police Station House Officer V. M. Sreekumar, who was on duty near Cliff House. As the protest threatened to escalate, police partially opened the barricade to allow the child to return home.

The student, Govind, a Class 5 student at Bharatiya Vidyabhavan School and son of Harikumar, a teacher at Mohandas College, held the police on their toes for some time. Govind’s house is located just next to where police had set up the barricade on the road to Cliff House to block protesters. He was returning home after school when the incident took place.

Police later explained the delay in removing the barricade by stating that protesters were still gathered nearby, even after the march had concluded. They said the road had to remain blocked, considering the possibility of clashes in the high-security zone.

A similar incident had occurred at this location years ago during a march to Cliff House organised by the LDF District Committee as part of the solar protests against the UDF government. On that occasion, a woman residing locally had an altercation with CPM leader Kadakampally Surendran, accusing him of unruly behaviour for demanding the removal of the barricade. The incident sparked a heated debate over the practice of blocking public roads during protests.