CPM announces mass rally demanding pattas to poor families

CHENNAI: Communist Party of India (Marxist) State Secretary P Shanmugam, announced a major public campaign demanding house pattas for urban residents and a rally in Chennai to hand over petitions to chief minister MK Stalin on December 16.

Speaking to reporters in Chennai, on Thursday, Shanmugam said that one-third of households in Chennai and its suburbs do not possess pattas despite residing there for decades. Although the Tamil Nadu government has repeatedly announced patta schemes, poor and working-class families are still forced to struggle for their land rights.

He added that rapid urbanisation has led to unused waterbodies being converted into residential complexes, with the government itself relocating people onto poramboke lands and providing them roads, drainage, drinking water, electricity and even collecting property tax.

“Despite this, residents are labelled encroachers and denied pattas citing reasons such as water catchment areas, government land, railway land or trust properties,” he said.

The party also criticised courts for issuing strict eviction orders based solely on decades-old records without considering present realities or people’s right to shelter.

The party also condemned the ongoing displacement of Scheduled Caste families from central Chennai under ‘city beautification’ drives and highlighted issues faced by residents of Kannagi Nagar and Semmancheri.

Shanmugam put forth several key demands, including re-surveying land across Tamil Nadu, granting pattas to long-term residents on government and private lands, issuing sale deeds and name transfers for Housing Board and Slum Clearance Board allottees, and regularising residents on temple lands with fair rent.

"To press these demands, CPI(M) will mobilise one lakh people for a mass petition march on December 16 at on Swami Sivananda Salai, culminating in submitting a petition to the Chief Minister," he said.