Kenmure Street

On the morning of May 13th 2021 two Sikhs, Sumit Sehdev and Lakhvir Singh, were detained by a group from the UK Border Force as they were alleged to be in the country illegally. A crowd quickly gathered to protest the detention, blocking the exit of the van the two men were held in. The sit-in started an 8 hour stand-off and at the end the men were released. The arrest attempt quickly become political with questions on the policy of the UK Border Force routinely using religious holidays to target people when they are most likely to be at home; whether Scotland should have a separate immigration policy than the rest of the UK and whether mass gatherings were a contravention of the regulations governing the current pandemic. Additional controversy was stirred with the suggestion that the protest was staged to create political capital. That seems unlikely but politicians of all colours were quick to weigh in.