Tamil Nadu reacts : on removal of posters; attack on Bank of Ceylon branch and partymen protesting Kushboo

On a day when Supreme Court scaled down the State’s appeal for 9 tmcft and directed release 2.44 tmcft, lot of other things cornered the news in Tamil Nadu.  Not many understand or are affected by the flow of Cauvery, irrigation, samba and harvesting…

Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapaksa has ruled out giving Tamils greater political autonomy. By doing so he has backed away from his long-standing promise to empower the ethnic minority as part of the country’s reconciliation process following a bloody civil war. Rajapaksa’s decision came despite growing international pressure to compromise with the defeated minority and to investigate allegations of war crimes.  This move would be seen as an act of confrontation with the UN Human Rights Council, which had censured Sri Lanka over its human rights record.   The relations between the Nation has hit a low with  India voting in favour of the motion last year censuring Sri Lanka at the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva. 

Chennai is plastered with posters, hoardings and digital banners on movies, political leaders, issues and more… 38  unauthorised hoardings and digital banners in Chennai were removed in two days, the district administration has submitted before the Madras High Court. Earlier, passing orders on a writ petition by K.R. Ramaswamy alias ‘Traffic’ Ramaswamy, a social activist, the court had directed the collector to remove all illegal hoardings, digital banners and placards immediately and also to take necessary action to penalise those who had contravened the rules and regulations under the Chennai City Municipal Corporation Act.

A  group of men attacked the Bank of Ceylon branch in Egmore on Thursday afternoon, causing injuries to some employees and police personnel on duty.  This reportedly is a sequel of protest against the visit of Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapaksa to India on Friday. It is reported that masked men entered the premises by pushing the two policemen on duty and damaged the guardroom and the bank’s signboard on the ground floor. The attack reportedly lasted only a couple of minutes. Eight CCTV cameras installed at different spots in the branch recorded the incidents from 1.30 p.m. to 1.32 p.m. According to a senior police official, the attackers have been indentified as members of an outfit. A hunt is on to apprehend them.  In the morning, police arrested a 15-member group that tried to lock the TTD information centre on Venkatanarayana Road in T. Nagar in protest against the visit of Mr. Rajapaksa to Tirupati. They were later released on bail.

Elsewhere actress turned politician Kushboo incurred the wrath of her partymen; irate DMK partymen flung slippers on actor Kushboo when she was getting into a car from a hotel in the city to proceed to the airport, protesting her views on succession in the party in an interview published in a Tamil magazine. However, the footwear missed the target and landed on the car’s windowpane.  Newspaper reports state that at the marriage she shared the dais with DMK chief M. Karunanidhi and party treasurer M. K. Stalin.  There were reports of another group of workers throwing stones and protesting at her residence too….

With regards – S. Sampathkumar

8th Feb 2013.