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Vijay vs Tamil Nadu: Blame game erupts after 41 die in Karur stampede
Police have maintained that Vijay's late arrival and lack of ample arrangements at the venue led to the chaos at TVK's Karur rally.
The blame game in the Karur stampede has begun a day after at least 41 people died and over a hundred were injured at actor-politician Vijay's rally in Tamil Nadu. The dead bodies of the stampede victims were handed over to their families on Sunday after post-mortem, while the injured are undergoing treatment at a hospital in Karur. Three of them are said to be critical.
The police have ruled out any intelligence failure and said that Vijay arrived at around late to the rally and people had been waiting almost the entire day for the Tamizhaga Vetri Kazhagam (TVK) leader.
The First Information Report, filed at Karur town police station, has charged TVK’s Karur (north) district secretary Madhiazhagan, general secretary Bussy Anand, and joint general secretary CTR Nirmal Kumar under sections 105 (culpable homicide), 110 (attempt to commit culpable homicide), and 125 (endangering life of others) of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita.
“Vijay also arrived three hours late to the venue in Karur after his rally in nearby Namakkal district,” Additional director general of police (law and order) Davidson Devasirvatham said.
About 500 police personnel were on the ground for TVK’s Saturday rally as higher turnout was expected, he said.
The police on ground had asked organisers to stop Vijay’s specially designed campaign bus at least 50 metres before the designated spot. “But, they insisted on parking where they had planned. And for 10 minutes, the leader (Vijay) didn’t come out of the vehicle which made the crowd go restless because they wanted to see him,” Devasirvatham said.
The TVK had reportedly sought permission for 10,000 people, but the the crowd swelled to around 25,000. Cops said that the party had not made ample arrangements such as drinking water and didn’t follow the conditions laid down by the police while giving permission.
The TVK counsel, S Arivazhagan, alleged a political conspiracy behind the incident and sought a court-monitored probe, or, an investigation by any “independent agency.”
Arivazhagan also accused the Tamil Nadu government and the state police and said that autopsies of the victims had been conducted in a rush, without identifying the bodies.
A petition was filed by N Senthilkannan, who suffered injuries at the rally and sought the TVK to be barred from holding further rallies and public meetings until all inquiries into the stampede were complete.
Tamil Nadu Chief Minister MK Stalin met the kin of the Karur stampede victims on Sunday morning and said, “In the history of our state, never has such a large number of people lost their lives in a program organised by a political party, and such a tragedy should never happen in the future either.” He announced an ex-gratia relief of ₹10 lakh for the kin of deceased and ₹1 lakh each for the injured.
“Once the truth is revealed, strict action will definitely be taken," Stalin said on chances of arresting Vijay.
Meanwhile, Karnataka Leader of the Opposition in the Legislative Council and BJP MLC, Chalavadi Narayanaswamy, called the Karur stampede unfortunate and a failure of both the state government and actor-politician Vijay.
“Vijay is new with no experience. On the other hand, the government also completely failed to control the crowd; therefore, it should have taken measures even before the event began,” he said.
Congress leader Supriya Shrinate said that leaders are “certainly responsible” for the stampedes. "I am deeply saddened by what happened. There was such a huge stampede that more than 36 people died, and many were injured. My condolences to all the families who are suffering this grief... As for stampedes, leaders are certainly responsible... But today is not the time for questions and answers, but to stand with the family of the deceased," Shrinate said.
CM Stalin appointed Justice Aruna Jagadeesan to head the committee to probe the stampede.
