SWARAJ INDIA STRONGLY CONDEMNS REPRESSION & BRUTALITY AGAINST FARMERS BY TAMIL NADU GOVERNMENT

ROHIT SHARMA :-  For several months now, the Government of Tamil Nadu has unleashed a reign of terror on villagers whose lands it wants to forcibly acquire for the  Chennai-Salem Greenfield Corridor. In continuation of such repression and brutality, on 23rd July, 2018, at Athipaadi village in Thiruvannamalai District, State Committee Member of Swaraj India’s farmers’ wing Jai Kisan Andolan and several of his family members were illegally and forcibly detained and taken away from their land by the police. The officials illegally cut the fence of a land, which is a private property, barged in and made unlawful erections on the property. When assembled farmers requested them to desist from the illegal activity and reminded them of the condemnation of the use of force by police officials by the Madras High Court, the police personnel abused and beat them mercilessly, arrested them and dragged them away. When owner of the land, 65 year old woman farmer and cancer-survivor tried to reason with the police, without regard to her age and health condition, the police dragged and beat her and abused her in all filthy language; she fainted due to this inhuman assault. The police refused to call for medical help and one Inspector named Boopathy remarked “let her die if that be the case”.

 

A by-stander Mr. Manoharan was also not spared (perhaps because he was a witness) and was arrested. An Engineering Graduate who was videographing the brutality was also detained. 

 

The above incident is typical of the on-going repression of farmers that has been launched by the Tamil Nadu Government. An illegal and un-democratic clamp-down has been imposed and even well-known politicians are not allowed to visit the locales of repression; those who have visited have all been arrested and detained. An undeclared emergency is prevailing in the Chennai – Salem Greenfield Corridor and no directions either under the Human Rights Act, 1993 or by the Courts of India are being obeyed or respected by the State authorities. Police has been arresting anyone and everyone without any basis, clearly violating the directions of the Supreme Court in the case of D.K. Basu v State of West Bengal and Ors. They not only failed to cite any reasons for the arrest, but also treated the arrestees inhumanly, thus violating the Constitution of India.

 

Yogendra Yadav, National President, Swaraj India said: Democracy is being trampled in the name of development in Tamil Nadu; livelihood of farmers is being destroyed by the Government; Swaraj India will join several organisations and soon send Fact Finding Team of eminent citizens to the affected villages.

 

A Government elected by the people is acting against the interest of people which cannot be tolerated in independent India, said Avik Saha, National Convener, Jai Kisan Andolan.

 

Brute force is being used by police against farmers and this will be met with resistance and resolve, said K. Balakrishnan, Tamil Nadu President, Swaraj India.

 

Christina Samy, National Vice-President, Swaraj India said: An undeclared state of emergency has been imposed by Tamil Nadu Government to grab farmers’ lands for fanciful projects of questionable necessity.