Ahead of protest march, police begins crackdown

A day ahead of their participation in a protest march in Chennai, members of government employees associations from various districts were detained on Monday as a preventive measure.

As many as 116 associations, which includes 34 teacher associations that are part JACTO-GEO, have called for a march to the secretariat on Tuesday demanding the payment of arrears as per the Seventh Pay Commission recommendations. The government employees are also demanding the implementation of the old pension scheme.

Police sources said that 17 leaders, including women members of the Joint Action Council of Teachers Organisations and Government Employees Organisations (JACTO-GEO), had been arrested in Coimbatore district since Sunday night. However, members of JACTO-GEO said that over 40 of their leaders were arrested and kept in hotels across the district.

In Tiruchi, 32 JACTO-GEO members including 16 women were detained while they were on their way to Chennai from Thoothukudi in an omni bus. G. Panchapakesan, Ariyalur district secretary of Tamil Nadu Government Employees Association, and Kumari Ananthan, a State executive committee member of the Tamil Nadu Revenue Officials Association from Perambalur were also arrested by the police.

K.P.O. Suresh, one of the coordinators of JACTO-GEO, said while there had not been any arrests in Chennai so far, many of their members who had been travelling to the city to participate in the march had been detained. “We are going ahead with the march towards the secretariat in the morning on Tuesday,” he said.

Condemning the midnight and early morning arrest of the leaders from their residences, Kumar, another coordinator of JACTO-GEO, said that the government had failed to inform the public about the salary hike and arrears given to MLAs and judges, but was trying to malign the legitimate demands of the protesters by propagating false information to the public.

“The government should take immediate steps to fill up over 5 lakh vacant posts in various departments and stop outsourcing government work to private agencies. We have further appealed to the government to invite us for negotiations about our long- pending and legitimate demands,” he said.

Parties condemn arrests

Political parties too condemned the preventive arrests of the government employees, including teachers. The State secretary of CPI (M), in a statement said that the government should ask the employees to participate in talks instead of threatening them and arresting them. Tamil Manila Congress leader G.K. Vasan too urged the government to free the 120 odd government employees who had been arrested.