Rights violation on arrested party leaders: DMK tells Prez

New Delhi, Sep 6: With several of its senior leaders in jail on alleged land grabbing charges, DMK today (Sep 6) accused the Tamil Nadu government of violating the directions of the Supreme Court while arresting them and sought President Pratibha Patil's intervention in the issue.

A delegation of DMK ministers and MPs led by its Parliamentary Party leader T R Baalu met Patil at the Rashtrapati Bhawan here and alleged that their arrested leaders were being subjected to "human rights violations".

The MPs, including Dayanidhi Maran and ministers of state S S Palanimanickam and Gandhi Selvan, said in a memorandum that the AIADMK government has constituted a special force to look into land grabbing during the DMK regime in a bid to "tarnish the public image" of the party.

Several former ministers, including Veerapandi S Arumugam, K N Nehru and K Ponmudi, and many DMK leaders were arrested in the continuing crackdown by the Jayalalithaa government on the land grabbing issue.

"The fundamental rights of the citizens are being violated and the arrested people are subjected to human rights violations. The observations made by Supreme Court on how to deal with an arrested person are not being followed at all," Rajya Sabha MP Tiruchi Siva told reporters after the meeting.

He alleged that the AIADMK government was "silent" on complaints of land grabbing against its ministers, MLAs and leaders.

"The DMK leaders are being arrested in midnight and are taken away to prisons far away from their homes so as to prevent their relatives to meet. An undeclared Emergency situation is prevailing in the state," he said.

The DMK leaders said the President gave a patient hearing to them.

PTI