The Karnataka Police on Tuesday booked Bharatiya Janata Party MLC CT Ravi and 12 others for allegedly obstructing public way and creating nuisance during a protest demanding Rural Development and Panchayat Raj Minister Priyank Kharge’s resignation, The Indian Express reported.

On Tuesday, the BJP leaders held a protest against Kharge in connection with the suicide of a contractor named Sachin Panchal, Deccan Herald reported.

The 26-year-old contractor took his own life on December 26 in Kalaburagi district.

In his suicide note, Panchal claimed that he had paid a bribe of Rs 15 lakh to former Kalaburagi City Corporation member Raju Kapnoor – a close associate of Kharge – and several other Congress leaders in hopes of being awarded a tender.

The note also claimed that he was pressured and issued death threats to pay an additional Rs 1 crore.

Following this, the BJP announced a state-wide agitation to protest the contractor’s death. The party also called for Kharge’s arrest and resignation as they claimed that it was his aides who were behind the suicide.

Kharge, on his part, has maintained that he had not been named in the note.

On Tuesday, the BJP leaders gathered on Race Course Road in Bengaluru and blocked the way at around 1 pm to demand Kharge’s resignation.

Subsequently, the police detained Ravi, Leader of Opposition in the Legislative Council Chalavadi Narayanaswamy and BJP leaders Ravikumar, Umesh Shetty, Shivakumar, Kiran Kumar Kasale, Harsha Hegde, Venkat, Karunakar, Nagesh, Prashanth, and Yadhuveer Rajendra Murthy.

All 13 leaders were eventually released, the Deccan Herald reported.

However, the police filed a first information report against the BJP leaders. The police claimed that they obstructed public movement and pasted handbills on a wall, according to The Indian Express.

“They stuck posters on a toilet wall, demanding Priyank’s resignation and raised slogans against the Congress,” the Deccan Herald quoted an unidentified police officer as saying in the FIR.

The 13 leaders were booked under the Karnataka Open Places Prevention of Disfigurement Act and sections of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita pertaining to the offence of wearing or carrying a token used by public servants with the intent to deceive others, public nuisance and joint liability in cases where multiple persons act with a common intention to commit a criminal act.