In yet another case of moral policing, an unidentified group questioned three friends for shopping together in a mall in Mangaluru. The three youngsters were around 22 years of age.

The trio, two girls and a boy, was confronted by the group as the three belonged to different communities, says The Hindu report. The Bangalore Mirror reported that the police intervened and rescued the three friends.

A complaint was registered against the yet-to-be-identified group under section 341 (wrongful restraint), Section 504 (intentional insult with intent to provoke breach of peach), section 506 (criminal intimidation) of IPC.

The Mangaluru North police told The Hindu that the youth and his classmates had come to the city for sightseeing. An hour after they came to the mall the unidentified group questioned the boy for moving around with his friends, one of whom was from a different community.

Home Minister K J George, who was in Mangaluru when the incident happened told the Bangalore Mirror, “Rowdy-sheets will be opened and frequent offenders will not be allowed to enter the district.” He asserted that the home department had been instructed to conduct a crackdown on those taking up the law in their own hands for the purpose of moral policing.

Mangalore is infamous for its violent self-styled vigilante groups who target mixed groups of men and women and Hindus and Muslims. The groups in the past have raided a pub, a home stay, an ice-cream joints, even confronted school girls and boys for posing playfully for a picture.