Chennai, July 25 (BPNS)
Tamil Nadu state intelligence has given inputs to the state police regarding the possibility of clashes between Dalit outfits and the Gounder community in Kallakurichi. It may be noted that on July 13, a plus two student jumped from the third floor of a school hostel building at Kallakurichi and committed suicide.
From July 13 onwards, the family of the girl, relatives, and friends were protesting in front of the Sakthi residential school demanding justice for the girl and to conduct a re-postmortem. While the protest was by and large peaceful, it took a violent turn on July 17th, Sunday leading to violence and arson with the school getting vandalized, school buses torched, police vans being torched and several two-wheelers in the school building were also destroyed. The police were woefully short and outnumbered by the protestors. Stone and bottles were pelted at the police injuring IG, Pandian, Superintendent of Police, Selvakumar, and several policemen. Police were able to bring peace after forces from adjoining districts were brought in for maintaining law and order in the area.
After the incidents have come to a close, an eerie silence is prevailing in Kallakurichi and adjacent Villupuram district where the student’s parents reside. Sources in the Tamil Nadu intelligence told BPNS that while the school is owned by a family belonging to the Gounder community, the girl belongs to the Agamudayar community and intelligence found that a person belonging to the Agamudayar community was the main brain behind the arson and torching of vehicles.
The Dalit outfit Viduthalai Chiruthaigal Katchi (VCK) is also responsible for the arson and the school authorities have according to the intelligence said that certain people belonging to the Adi Dravidar community, a Dalit community were responsible for the arson.
While police and the district administration agree to the fact that the attack on the school was pre-planned and well orchestrated, the input on the possible clashes in the districts of Kallakurichi and Villupuram is being seriously taken up by the police authorities.
A senior officer with the Tamil Nadu police in Kallakurichi while speaking to BPNS said, “ The areas surrounding Kallakurichi and Villupuram districts have a history of clashes on the basis of caste and intelligence inputs will have to be seriously taken into account. Police is keeping a track of all those people who were earlier involved in such clashes.”
The intelligence, according to sources in the department has directed the schools in and around Kallakurichi and Villupuram not to reprimand Dalit students belonging to the Adi Dravidar community in these districts.
The authorities of Sakthi school that suffered arson and violence have complained that the main brain behind the attack was still at large and that the concerned person may be indulging in invoking caste consciousness leading to the possibilities of further clashes.
