Chennai, Nov 16 (BPNS)
Tamil Nadu Chief Minister, M.K. Stalin on Wednesday ordered for the payment of Rs 5 lakh as enhanced amount to the families of each person killed in the Thoothukudi police firing of 2018 on protestors at the Sterlite plant of Vedanta group.
It may be noted that the state government had in the Tamil Nadu legislative assembly meeting in October 2022 announced to provide Rs 5 lakh as extra compensation to the families of victims in the police firing.
It may be noted that there are 13 victims in the police firing of 2018 and with the announcement of the Chief Minister, the state will have to spend Rs 65 lakhs extra from its exchequer for the families of the deceased protestors. The state had already paid a compensation of Rs 20 lakh to the families of each protestors who died in the police firing of Thoothukudi in May 2018.
The Justice Aruna Jagadeesan commission constituted by the government to study on the police firing had given its report and the Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu ,M.K. Stalin had during the presentation of the report in the state legislative assembly in October 2018 announced that a solatium of Rs 5 lakh extra will be paid to the families of each protestor who was killed in the firing.
The report had come down heavily on the police officers and said ,” The conclusion then becomes irresistible that there had been excess on the part of the police. The totality of the facts and circumstances would not suggest that the police had been acting in the exercise of the right of private defense. As a matter of fact, it has not even been the version of the police.”
It may be noted that the police officers who are severally accountable are IG Shailesh Kumar Yadav, DIG Kapil Kumar C. Karatkar and SP, P . Mahendran, and 17 other officers.
