In a new twist in Tutticorin violence, fishermen from Therespuram in Thoothukudi have claimed that they have nothing to do with violence which broke out on 22nd May and the fishermen have further submitted a petition to the district legal services authority accusing advocates belonging to a far left fringe group, Makkal Adhikaram to have instigated some innocent youths.
The local fishermen, in the petition, also stated that, “We, the members of the fishermen community, decided to protest in the place designated by the police as per the permission given. However, the Makkal Adhikaram Association and some of its lawyers diverted our poor people towards the District Collectorate and engaged in violence.”
The petition further claims, “Through videos on social media and by directly meeting with people at protest sites, lawyers Hariraghavan and others [from Makkal Adhikaram] made speeches that roused passions and drove home the notion that picketing the collector’s office should be our sole target.”
Earlier, six members of Makkal Adhikaram were arrested under the National Security Act, ten days after anti-sterlite violence broke out. This left-wing organization also protested against other big projects such as the Kudankulam nuclear power plant and it has also participated in many other protests over the Cauvery dispute, TASMAC and Sterlite.
Earlier reports too had suggested the involvement of certain separatist outfits, the naxals and the church in instigating the violence. Tamil Nadu government cracked down on the cadre of the pro LTTE outfit, Naam Tamilar Party. The party’s organizer, Vinayarasu was arrested on the charges of setting the employees quarters of UK based Vedanta’s Sterlite copper plant in Thoothukudi.
Yasin Malik, chairman of Jammu Kashmir Liberation front, recently in a gathering of members of Naam Tamilar, pro-LTTE outfits, supported the demand for separate Tamil Eelam on the eve of the death anniversary of LTTE leader Velupillai Prabhakaran at a marriage hall in Cuddalore in Tamil Nadu. He also said that the Tamil Eelam is the goal of each and every Tamil person.
Swarajya Magazine had earlier reported that the churches in the region had appealed to its members to support the Thoothukudi protest. The magazine had also reported that one of the mobs, comprising of around 5,000 people, had gathered in front of one of the churches in the region before it proceeded to wreak havoc. The article goes on to claim that according to the Intelligence Bureau, there were Naxal elements among the protestors too, and that the police had been tipped off about this.
All these reports clearly debunk the myth that this was people’s uprising and expose the anti-sterlite racket completely. It was actually a meticulously planned and executed riot by few groups with their selfish interests at cost of innocent lives of poor people. Everything was going peacefully and fine, the problem started as the Rajnikant has observed, “after anti-social elements attacked police & burned down Collector’s office, as a result peaceful protesters were killed.”
It’s good to see that finallyfishermen of Thoothukudi have gathered courage and come out in the open to speak the truth about the the anti-sterlite protest and the ensuing violence. Once again, men of power- the left-wing intelligentsia- used people to further their agenda. The main goal of left wing establishment is perfectly summed up in the following quote of Eric Hoffer: “When watching men of power in action it must be always kept in mind that, whether they know it or not, their main purpose is the elimination or neutralization of the independent individual- the independent voter, consumer, worker, owner, thinker- and that every device they employ aims at turning men into a manipulable animated instrument which is Aristotle’s definition of a slave.”