Thoothukudi firing: Police were aiming for the gut and shoulder, says Kamal Haasan

Actor and Makkal Needhi Maiam founder Kamal Haasan said he saw about 20 people in Thoothukudi government hospital with bullet injuries to their upper body indicating that they were fired upon from a long distance. He saw only one person with a leg injury during his visit on Wednesday.

“They [police] were aiming for the gut and shoulder,” Mr. Haasan said, charging that the entire police operation during the 100th day of the current agitation against the Sterlite Copper plant in the town on May 22 was carried out against standard policing protocols.

Even if those going in procession were throwing stones, the police had the equipment to face the situation, and officers usually “wait at the the peril of their life for a magistrate’s order.” In Thoothukudi, given that the agitation was going on for 100 days, and there was an announcement of the hundredth day protest, why was it not monitored and escalated to higher levels of government for a solution, he asked in an interview to The Hindu on Friday.

Kamal’s warning

The MNM leader warned that there should be no attempt at burying the large-scale violence that engulfed the town by making an individual policeman the scapegoat. To say that “one police officer went berserk and did it is not acceptable,” he said.

Mr. Haasan said the handling of the Jallikattu protests in January 2017 and torching of vehicles then showed that police personnel could themselves be involved in arson. Why was there no suspension of police personnel involved, and only transfers in Thoothukudi, he asked.