Police broke up a mass fast against graft led by India's most famous yoga guru on Sunday, risking more political headaches for the scandal-tainted government. A senior ruling party figure said the saffron-robed swami Ramdev had used the anti-corruption event to incite people.
Police detained the guru and flew him to the northern Indian centre of his $40 million-a-year global yoga and health empire. The campaign by Ramdev, who plans to launch a political party ahead of the 2014 general election, followed allegations of kickbacks at the Commonwealth Games and a telecoms scam that may have cost the government $39 billion.
Political analysts said the police action could spark protests by Ramdev's millions of supporters and dent the government's popularity in electorally important northern states.
Ramdev accused the police of brutality when they broke up the hunger strike which he and thousands of supporters started in New Delhi on Saturday in a marquee the size of four football pitches. Police said 39 supporters of the guru and 23 policemen were injured in the pre-dawn raid.
"My hunger strike has not ended. I will continue fasting," Ramdev later told a news conference in his base of Haridwar, a town in the foothills of the Himalayas. Ramdev, who rose from an illiterate family to host a television show with 30 million viewers, carries such weight in India that four government ministers met him when he arrived by private jet in New Delhi. Tapping into spiralling voter anger at corruption as Asia's third largest economy booms, the guru has called on the government to pursue billions of dollars in illegal funds abroad and the withdrawal of high denomination bank notes. Graft has long been part of daily life in India and can affect everything from getting an electricity connection to signing business deals.