Kochi, Jan 2 (IANS): Leader of Opposition VD Satheesan on Tuesday slammed the Kerala Police for differential treatment meted out to protesters waving black flags.

Satheesan, reading out from the two FIR’s registered on Monday, one against the student and youth wing of the Congress party for waving black flags against Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan at Kochi and the other for the same kind of protest by the student and youth wing of the CPI(M) against Governor Arif Mohammed Khan in the state capital city.

“Strange are the ways in which the police behave! For the same crime, our people were slapped with non-bailable charges, while the CPI(M)’s people were booked under bailable charges,” said Satheesan.

“The situation in Kerala is such that the police are being ruled by a coterie sitting in Vijayan’s office who give directions to their respective party offices and who direct the police stations in their areas. That was what happened in Kochi on Monday when non-bailable charges were slapped on our workers,” added Satheesan.

Satheesan’s statement just endorsed what Khan has been saying in the past.

Both Khan and Vijayan have been taking on one another in the media and the former on Monday reiterated that the protests against him had the blessings of the latter. This came in the wake of the fact that Vijayan last week applauded the protests of their party workers against Khan as “done by a generation which will take forward the state in a big way.”