Jasmine plants worth Rs 10 lakh torched in Thangachimadam

The incident happened at the jasmine garden of one Mahesh. The plants were torched in the wee hours of Sunday. Mahesh had planted 5 lakh saplings in his land of five cents. He rushed to his land and fought hard to douse the fire. But the plants were completely destroyed. He then filed a complaint with Thangachimadam police and a case was registered. Police had started to investigate the case.  Local sources claimed that this was third such incident in the last two months as earlier, the jasmine gardens of Moorthy and Karan were destroyed in a similar fashion. There was a dispute between two groups regarding a temple festival. Recently, one of the group received a favourable order from the court in the temple festival case. Sources suspect that the opposite group persons might be involved in the torching of the jasmine plants. They added that the jasmine plants from Thangachimadam area were world-famous. The plant and the flowers were being exported to countries like Singapore and Malaysia. They were of high quality and any further damage to the plants would affect the owners badly, said the sources.