Indian police detained 27 Tibetan protesters and deployed 5,000 policemen Tuesday ahead of the local leg of the Beijing Olympic torch relay, hoping to avoid chaotic protests by Tibet supporters, a police officer said Tuesday.


Police held the Tibetans after they marched along the path the Beijing Olympic torch is scheduled to take through New Delhi on Thursday, Rajan Bhagat, spokesman for New Delhi police.
Protesters lit a symbolic torch and chanted, "No Olympics in China" and "Freedom for Tibet."
Bhagat said the detainees were not charged and would likely be freed soon.
Tibetan groups have been holding mostly peaceful demonstrations in India since protests began in Lhasa, the Tibetan capital, on March 10, the anniversary of a failed uprising against Chinese rule.
Protests against China's human rights record have marred the torch's passage through Western cities.
Indian authorities have shortened the torch route from seven kilometers (four miles) to three kilometers (1.8 miles) to help prevent any disturbances, police officer Darshan Singh said.
The Olympic torch carried by top Indian athletes and some Bollywood stars will pass through a high security zone from the president's palace to India Gate, a war memorial in New Delhi.
Chinese authorities say 22 people died in anti-Beijing riots that broke out last month in Lhasa. The Tibetan government-in-exile says more than 140 were killed.
Nearly 100,000 Tibetans are living in India in exile.
The Dalai Lama fled to India after a failed uprising in 1959 in Tibet, but he remains the religious and cultural leader of many Tibetans. He was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1989