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Ashish Chatterjee urged fisherfolk to maintain law and order. Student-teacher ratio in primary schools shouldnt exceed 30:1.
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37,000 ILLEGAL STRUCTURES MAY BE PULLED DOWN
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July 10: An accused arrested by the police in connection with an attempt to murder case allegedly died in police custody here late Saturday night. The police said Chidambaram, 36, of Vadakkal village near Budalur in Thanjavur district, brandished a sickle and threatened to murder a van driver, Sundarraj, 25, of Lembalakkudi Nagarathupatti at Usilankulam bus stop following a quarrel between them on Saturday. On a complaint from Sundarraj, the Gansesh Nagar police registered a case and arrested Chidambaram. He was taken to police station for questioning. Later in the night, he complained of chest pain and was admitted to Pudukottai GH. He died without responding to treatment, police said. The police said Chidambaram was acting as henchman of a local don and he was involved in several cases including the murder of DMK unit secretary Senthil who was killed in Aranthangi a year ago. Sources said Chidambaram along with two associates came to Pudukottai on Saturday. When they saw the police, his associates fled. The cops suspect that the trio could have come to Pudukottai on an assignment to murder a local VIP.
A little boy gazes at a larger-than-life poster of a model advertising an apparel showroom at the Fashion DC Fair at the Chennai Trade Centre on Sunday.
July 10: A homeless boy, L. Manikandan, is thrilled at getting an engineering seat on merit, but was stuck when filling up the application forms because he had nothing to write in the address column. I could not write that my family lives on the pavement. We have never had an address, he told Deccan Chronicle. A good Samaritan got him into a government school but the boy had to sometimes work in a brick kiln in Salem to help his family. Despite all odds, 18-year-old scored 915 marks in the Plus-2 exams. Time has come for Manikandan to leave Taramangalam village to study
Child worker L. Manikandan with his family at the DC brick kiln at Taramangalam.
for his degree on electrical and instrumental engineering in a private college in Coimbatore. I need financial help for my hostel fees and tuition fees, he said over phone. His sheer deter-
mination has led him to become the first person in his generation to complete school education. Manikandans family has to spend the entire day in the brick kiln to get just `300.
He says his little brother Udhay kumar, 6, sister Sathya, 14, and his parents Lakshmanan, 58, Saraswathi, 48, start work at 5 am. Only if we work for 15 hours a day, can we be sure of a days gruel. Now that my father is ill and hospitalised, I have no support to manage our family, he said. Saraswathi is happy about her sons education. But I have no money to part with for his college expenses, she regretted. We put him in a government-aided school and encouraged him to score high marks. We are overjoyed by his performance. Now, we need monetary assistance to send him to college, teacher M. Lakshmi said. Volunteers can contact: 8220109595.
July 10: Over 37,000 unauthorised buildings including 147 high-rises in the city earmarked for demolition by a high court-appointed monitoring committee could be razed with the decks being cleared for the Chennai Metropolitan Development Authority (CMDA) to either regularise or pull down these constructions. Owners of these properties, who got away with flagrant building violations for long, are worried after the high court appointed monitoring committee was empowered to raze illegal structures following a Supreme Court verdict. The committee will meet on July 15 to decide on the action to be taken against unauthorised buildings in Chennai. The Supreme Court had on March 15 vacated its previous order of status quo on regularisation of unauthorised constructions by CMDA. This has paved the
way for the unauthorised constructions completed before July 27, 2007 was stopped after the Supreme Court ordered status quo in December 2007. Now that the decks are cleared we will discuss the action to be taken on these structures, especially multistorey commercial complexes, a member of the monitoring committee, that convenes after six months, told DC on Sunday. He said they could take action even against structures constructed recently.
The state government had announced a scheme that sought to regularise building violations in the Chennai Metropolitan Area by allowing the owners to pay a penalty. This scheme, well received by thousands of building owners, was subsequently extended till 2002. The issue went to the high court that constituted a committee to oversee multistorey buildings constructed in violation of plan, coastal regulatory zone provisions and other development control rules. Meanwhile, an ordinance was promulgated by the government, which later became an act, on July 27, 2007 for specified categories of unauthorised structures preventing demolition for a year. The law was extended in subsequent years and later extended till July 2011. The member said he was hopeful that that the present government would not extend the ordinance which supported illegal structures.
July 10: As many as 13 child brides were saved from the fatal knot just before their muhurtham by government officials in Dharmapuri district on Sunday, according to information reaching here. Acting on tip-offs from secret informers in each village, a team of policemen and local officials stopped 13 weddings across seven
villages in the district, on Sunday, which was an auspicious marriage muhurtham day. The backward Dharmapuri district is notorious for child marriages, where illiterate villagers marry off their minor daughters to much older men sometimes widowers and divorcees. The parents are usually desperate to rid themselves of the responsibility of their daughters, since they tend to migrate from one village to
the other in search of work. They feel it is unsafe to leave their daughters in the care of neighbours and rela-
tives; that is why they are in a hurry to marry them off. They are illiterate and do not know better, said district revenue officer (DRO) S. Ganesh, pointing out that they hold routine awareness campaigns. The DRO said that they had posted secret informers in each village, to give them details of any child marriages being planned. They had received information weeks in advance, and had also sent district officials to
meet and counsel the parents of the little girls. Some parents agreed to cancel the weddings, and promised to wait until their daughters turned 18. However, many of them went ahead with the wedding plans on Sunday. The Tahsildar and local police formed many teams and stopped 13 weddings, rescuing girls aged from 15 to 17, said Mr Ganesh, stressing that legal action will be taken against the girls parents.
July 10: Thousands of devotees witnessed the maha samprokshanam of Sri Sundarraja Perumal Temple at Alagarkoil in Melur taluk in Madurai on Sunday. Situated at the foot of Azhagar hills 20 km north of Madurai, the temple, the abode of presiding deity Lord Sundarraja Perumal, also known as Lord Kallazhagar, was renovated at an estimated cost of `15 crore with funds from the temple and private donors. With the restoration of the temple tank, laying of concrete road on car street and other civil works, the ancient temple received a major facelift in view of the maha samprokshanam.
One among the 108 vaishnavite divya desams, the consecration of the temple was performed after a hiatus of 16 years. With Hindu religious and charitable endowment minister S.P. Shunmuganathan waving off the green flag, priests poured holy water on the kalasams in six towers including the rajagopuram and somasandha vimana at 9.03 am to mark the consecration. As priests recited vedic
hymns, a large number of devotees who thronged the temple from across the state chanted govinda, govinda in religious fervour. About 225 priests from several vaishnavite temples including Tirupathi had come over to Alagarkoil to perform pujas. With 52 kundams, the yagasala had begun on Wednesday. The temple administration had installed sprinklers to sprinkle the holy water on all devotees who were given prasadam. LED screens were placed at six points to facilitate devotees witness the ceremony. State ministers Natham R. Viswanathan and Sellur K. Raju, collector U. Sagayam, thakkar V.R. Venkatachalam, almost all MLAs from Madurai district attended the function.
GRIEVANCES GALORE
July 10: Residents of Ullagaram presented a bunch of petitions to environment minister T.K.M. Chinnaiah, South Chennai MP Chitlapakkam Rajendran and Sholinganallur MLA K.P. Kandan, who attended a meeting on Sunday. The main problems they highlighted were stray dog menace, low voltage and drainage overflow during the two-hour meet. The minister and MP promised the petitioners they would not behave like other politicians and their grievances would be addressed soon. Ullagaram and Puzhuthivakkam taxpayers and residents association president C.C. Maheswaran said over 300 households reside in Balaji Nagar, Perumal Nagar and Gomathi Street. Due to low voltage, we cannot even use tubelights. No officials from the electricity department give proper response, he said. The group immediately pulled up officials and ordered them to ensure electricity supply. Many complained that MTC bus service from St.
Thomas Mount to Puzhuthivakkam and other Chennai suburbs are not available after 8 pm. Many office-goers return home late in the evenings. They are forced to spend more on share autos. Women are vulnerable for abuse during the late evening trips by autos, they said. They added that automen fleece them and charge `150 to drop them at Puzhuthivakkam from St. Thomas Mount.
Social Service Trusts R. Rangasamy complained that Madipakkam, Ram Nagar neighbourhoods were prone to floods. Our neighbourhood has over 3,000 houses. Though we have informed the officials to make arrangements to prevent flooding, they did not lend an ear to our worries, he said. Desilting of Puzhuthivakkam lake is the best option to save rainwater, said the residents.
July 10: A fast-developing Velachery is not yet ready to deal with the increasing vehicular traffic and demands posed by an equally increased pedestrian population. Field visit and analysis conducted by Chennai Traffic and Transportation Forum (TTF) reveals that the government departments entitled to ensure road safety and seamless flow of traffic are not doing so. According to TTF project director V. Subramanian, in the coming years traffic would be a major issue for the fast-growing city, equally problematic as drinking water scarcity. There is no coordination among the government agencies like the highways department, the traffic police and the MTC. And that is the curse of Chennai. For instance, the partlywidened road from Vijaynagar Junction (VNJ) to Velachery MRTS still has electricity poles in the middle of the road. None of these departments has taken steps to remove it, causing much trouble to the passersby, Mr Subramanian added. C. Amrithalingam, a local resident, says that the public had appealed several times to relocate the bus shelter
near VNJ signal so as to ease the traffic flow. The M21 service towards Tambaram halts at this bus stop resulting in traffic getting chocked, up to one kilometre. As per international standards, bus shelters should never be set up near traffic signals. However, MTC is yet to take any action. Absence of road dividers along this stretch too is not helping matters. According to the highways department sources a grade separator is in store for the locality, which will solve traffic issues to a great extent. But how long do we have to wait? Amrithalingam added. No steps are taken to ensure safety or comfort of pedestrians too. While most roads at Velachery do not have zebra crossings, squatters occupy the available pedestrian paths. Haphazard parking of vehicles force pedestrians to walk by the side of the road rendering them to be at the mercy of vehicle users, said V. Rama Rao, project director, TTF. Ultimately, what the city requires is a traffic engineering authority where members of MTC, traffic police, highways department and the city corporation sit together and furnish ideas to solve traffic-related problems, Mr Rama Rao added.
The pedestrian paths on both sides of the Vijaynagar Junction Road are occupied by migrant labourers, forcing pedestrians to walk on the roads, totally at the mercy of speeding DC vehicles.