CMB: Farmers, politicos gear up for fresh battle

Tamil nationalist outfits too have started coming out with suggestions ranging picketing in front of Central government offices to appealing to people to stop paying taxes to the Centre. 

The first protest was started by the Cauvery Rights Retrieval Committee headed by P Maniarasan at Thanjavur. The members of the committee along with farmers came to the streets and blocked the traffic. They were arrested by the police who initially tried to pacify them and requested them to withdraw the protests.

Maniarasan, while being taken in the police van said, the farmers in Tamil Nadu should disrupt the functioning of all the Central government institutions in the state. 

Thamizhaga Vazhvurimai Katchi leader T Velmurugan went a step further and said a campaign should be started to appeal to the people of the state to stop paying taxes to the Centre. When the Centre itself is placing party interests above the Supreme Court judgment and the law, people need not respect the law, he reasoned. Co-ordinator of the Federation of farmers unions in Tamil Nadu PR Pandian, who is protesting in Delhi against the Centre said farmers would stage a protest in front of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s house.