CHENNAI: Egmore MLA I Paranthamen on Monday assured the 50 families of evicted platform dwellers of proper housing within two months. Addressing the protesters, the MLA asked, “Do you want to stay in the road or house?”, and added measures were being taken to give them housing within the locality.
To this the pavement dwellers said, if it would take only two months they would continue to stay in the platform. “You are putting us in a shelter for homeless and destitute. The shelter is only for those wandering the streets,” they said.
The MLA said they were temporarily put up in the Corporation shelter since it was monsoon season, for which the residents said they have faced cyclones and pandemics out in the open. However, by the end of the discussion a few of them decided to move to the shelter hoping they would soon be given houses. “We will stay in the shelter for now and if we don’t get homes then we will come back to the platforms.”
Earlier, the Corporation put up a notice board on the pavements which said anyone encroachers would be prosecuted. In this regard, a few protesters were taken to the nearby police station. Some protesters claimed that the police threatened to book them under false cases.