CHENNAI, Oct 3: Slamming both actor-turned neta and Tamilaga Vettri Kazhagam (TVK) Flounder President Vijay and the Tamil Nadu police for the September 27 ghastly stampede at Karur which claimed 41 lives, the Madras High Court today ordered constitution of a Special Investigation Team (SIT) to probe the tragedy.
The SIT would be headed by senior Police officer and Inspector General North Zone Asra Garg.
Passing orders, Justice N Senthilkumar, expressed deep dissatisfaction over the probe by the local police and noted that the State appeared to be going soft on the TVK leadership and ‘showing leniency’ to the TVK leaders who have ‘fled the scene of occurrence’
even after scores of women and children have died in the stampede.
Mr Asra Garg recently handled the murder case of K Armstrong, who was BSP State president, and arrested all the accused within
a short span of time.
The horrendous stampede took place at the mass outreach of Vijay, which attracted massive crowds, in the disastrous night of that Saturday. Besides the 41 deceased, more than 60 people were injured in the stampede.
The DMK government headed by Chief Miniser M K Stalin, acted swiftly, convened a high level emergency meeting at the State Secretariat late night on that day and constituted a One Member Commission of Inquiry headed by Justice (retd) Ms Aruna Jagadeesan, immediately after the tragedy struck and the panel is already on the job.
Now, the High Court has ordered the SIT probe on a PIL.
Registering the court’s ‘high condemnation,’ for the TVK leaders’ act of abandoning the innocent people who had gathered in droves
at Velusamypuram, the venue at Karur, just to have a glimpse of actor Vijay, the Judge noted that they had ended up losing their lives.
Instead of vanishing from the scene, the party should have come to their rescue, he observed adding that it was a huge man-made catastrophe that right from the President to Chief Minister have expressed deep condolences and offered every possible assistance to
the families of the deceased and the injured.
During the course of the hearing, the Judge referring to Vijay and other TVK leaders fleeing the scene, observed, “the party had not
even expressed remorse, and it shows the mental state of the leader (Vijay).”
In the same breath, the court pulled up the police saying, “What has the police done so far but for arresting two people.”
Taking note of the fact that the police have not even named Vijay in the FIR, the Court directed the Karur Town Inspector of Police
to hand over all the papers related to the FIR registered against TVK General Secretary Bussy N Anand and Deputy General Secretary CTR Nirmal Kumar as well as others on the charge of culpable homicide. The Karur police have already arrested two district-level functionaries of the TVK, Mathialagan and Pounraj in connection with the tragedy.
(UNI)
Follow our WhatsApp channel
