TIRUCHY: Over a dozen sugarcane farmers were arrested in Thanjavur on Monday for attempting to wave a black flag at visiting Chief Minister MK Stalin, demanding the release of Thiru Arooran Sugar factory’s Rs 100 crore pending dues.

According to sources, the Thiru Arooran Sugar factory at Thirumandankudi in Thanjavur was closed in 2018 due to losses, but the farmers were not given the due crushing charges worth Rs 100 crore. Apart from this, the factory administration had reportedly obtained loans worth Rs 300 crore from nationalised banks in the names of the farmers and failed to repay them, resulting in bank officials approaching the respective farmers to insist on repayment of the loans.

This prompted the farmers to organise indefinite protests for the past 900 days, since November 30, 2022, demanding the release of pending dues and resolving bank issues, but to no avail. Frustrated over the apathy as no one looked at their concern, farmers resorted to protest during Chief Minister’s Delta visit.

In this backdrop, on Monday, as the Chief Minister, MK Stalin, was scheduled to participate in several programmes, the farmers expressed their dissatisfaction with a black flag protest. As the Chief Minister was on his way to Tiruvaiyaru to take part in party MLA Chandrasekaran’s family wedding, the farmers who were waiting for the convoy ran to the road waving a black flag, but the police who were on duty stopped them.

Police personnel forcibly evicted the protesters from the road, arrested all 12 farmers, and took them to separate places.