CHENNAI: Even as the protest by the differently abled continued for the third day, Madras High Court took suo-motu cognizance of newspaper reports relating to the death of a hearing-impaired senior citizen during the protest.
The first bench of Chief Justice SK Kaul and Justice MM Sundresh, after taking note of newspaper reports, ordered issuance of notices to the Secretaries of Home and Social Welfare departments returnable by March 1.
E Kuppuswami (67), a hearing impaired man who was in the protest held by by four different organisations in the city. On Wednesday night, he complained of chest pain at the Egmore Rajarathinam stadium where police moved all the protestors. On Thursday morning, he died in the hospital.
The six-point charter of demands of the persons with disabilities included a judicial commission to look into the failure to implement 3 per cent job reservation in the State for differently abled, 40 per cent hike in monthly allowance like other states and also removal of criteria that, only orphans will be given benefits and also provide 100 houses for differently abled in all the districts with transport facilities.