The Geography of Dissent: When Protest Is Moved Beyond Power

Every democracy decides where its citizens may protest. The more revealing question is where those in power are willing to listen.

Delhi Police's October 11 order, signed by Commissioner Anurag Kumar, denotifying Jantar Mantar Road as the Capital's designated protest site is, on paper, an administrative decision. Issued through a partial modification of Standing Order No. L&O/48/22 (April 28, 2022), it comes amid protests by the INDIA bloc, the Cockroach Janta Party (CJP) and student groups over alleged irregularities in the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls, soon after the NEET agitation that forced the resignation of a Union Education Minister. Yet the debate it has triggered extends well beyond traffic management or policing. It asks whether India is balancing public order with democratic freedoms, or gradually relocating dissent beyond the everyday sight of power.

The history of Delhi's protest sites reveals a consistent pattern. The Boat Club lawns near Parliament once embodied the Republic's democratic theatre until Mahendra Singh Tikait's massive farmers' mobilisation in 1988 exposed the vulnerability of the governance core. Security concerns in the early 1990s accelerated the shift to Jantar Mantar, a smaller and more manageable site that remained within walking distance of Parliament and the national media. Today, the journey continues. Protest has moved from Boat Club to Jantar Mantar and now towards Ramlila Maidan, Burari Ground and CBD Ground, each step placing greater physical distance between citizens and the institutions they seek to influence.

For more than three decades, Jantar Mantar became India's democratic antechamber, a marketplace of grievances where farmers, students, veterans, workers, women, environmental groups and ordinary citizens shared little except the belief that power should remain within hearing distance. From Anna Hazare's anti-corruption movement and the post-Nirbhaya demonstrations to One Rank One Pension veterans, anti-CAA protesters, wrestlers and NEET aspirants, its significance lay not merely in the protests it hosted but in the visibility it guaranteed. Even small organisations, unable to fill vast grounds or command television studios, could still place their concerns before the nation's political establishment.

The Supreme Court recognised this constitutional value in Mazdoor Kisan Shakti Sangathan v. Union of India (2018), striking down the National Green Tribunal's blanket ban on protests at Jantar Mantar. The judgment drew an essential distinction. The State may regulate assemblies to protect public order under Articles 19(2) and 19(3), but it cannot convert regulation into effective prohibition. Democratic inconvenience cannot become a constitutional excuse for silencing democratic participation.

The government's concerns are nevertheless legitimate. Central Delhi houses Parliament, ministries and constitutional authorities within an increasingly sensitive security zone. Large demonstrations have disrupted traffic, inconvenienced residents and complicated policing. Acting on a Ministry of Home Affairs committee's recommendations, Delhi Police has designated alternative venues with distinct purposes. Ramlila Maidan can host around 50,000 people and remains suitable for major political rallies. Burari Ground is designed for prolonged sit-ins and encampments, while CBD Ground in Shahdara caters to regional demonstrations. Recent Supreme Court observations also favoured larger protest sites equipped with drinking water, sanitation, medical facilities and emergency access.

Yet democratic space cannot be measured in acreage alone.

A protest derives its strength not only from numbers but from proximity. Jantar Mantar's greatest asset was that even modest demonstrations unfolded within sight of Parliament, ministries and national media. Burari and CBD Ground may be administratively efficient, but they cannot replicate that symbolic and political visibility. A protest that is permitted but cannot effectively reach policymakers or capture public attention risks becoming constitutionally protected yet politically diminished.

Accessibility raises an equally troubling question. Reports suggest that Ramlila Maidan remains heavily booked and can cost well over ₹1 lakh a day after deposits and taxes. Such barriers are manageable for large political parties but prohibitive for students, farmers, labour unions and smaller civil society groups. A constitutional right should not become easier to exercise for those with greater financial resources.

Nor is this merely about one order. Successive governments, irrespective of political ideology, have responded to inconvenient demonstrations by moving them farther from the centres of authority, invoking security, sanitation, traffic or public order. The logic carries echoes of colonial governance, where public assembly was managed through designated spaces and executive permissions. Independent India must resist reducing peaceful protest to an administratively contained activity rather than a democratic conversation.

The world's vibrant democracies understand this principle. Hyde Park in London, the National Mall in Washington and Gwanghwamun Plaza in Seoul are not just open spaces; they are civic arenas where governments remain visibly accountable to citizens. Democracies weaken not only when protests are banned, but also when they are quietly pushed beyond public view.

India undoubtedly needs better protest infrastructure, clear security protocols and minimal disruption to urban life. But the answer cannot be the progressive peripheralisation of dissent. Alternative venues must be affordable, accessible, well-equipped and politically visible. Permission procedures should be transparent, time-bound and subject to judicial oversight so that regulation strengthens, rather than weakens, the constitutional right to peaceful assembly.

The denotification of Jantar Mantar is therefore more than an administrative order. It is a test of India's democratic imagination. The true measure of a republic is not whether it allows citizens to protest somewhere, but whether it preserves spaces where those who govern are compelled to see, hear and answer those they govern.