THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: A day after the ministers had a war of words with the Latin Church leaders, the state government on Tuesday trained its gun on the Congress party and maintained that the flare-up at Muthalapozhi was a political conspiracy.
Transport Minister Antony Raju said Congress workers from outside assembled at Muthalapozhi to block the three ministers, who had gone there to coordinate rescue activities. The minister said there was a conscious effort to stoke up tension and it was due to the patience shown by the ministers that a riot was averted.
“There were more than 100 fishermen there when we reached Muthalapozhi. Out of these only four people, including a Mahila Congress district president, protested against us,” the minister said. He further alleged that those who protested were not local residents or relatives of those who had died and if not for the intervention of the ministers, the Congress workers would have clashed with the fishermen.
Ministers V Sivankutty, Antony Raju, and G R Anil were blocked by the protestors at Muthalapozhi on Monday when they went there to review the search operation that was launched after one fisherman died and three went missing when their boat capsized at the mouth of the harbour.
The ministers had alleged that Latin Archdiocese Vicar General Fr Eugine H Pereira tried to instigate the fishermen against them. After the allegation was raised by the ministers, Anchuthengu police registered a case against Fr Eugine for wantonly giving provocation with intent to cause a riot. The government stand had angered the Church and the Latin Catholic outfits conducted a Secretariat march on Monday night.
The new reaction of Raju apparently marks a shift in the approach of the state government, which had initially tried to corner the Church leaders for the imbroglio.
Meanwhile, Fr Eugine said a case was registered against him in a bid to make him silent. “What’s happening is state-sponsored terrorism. Due to involvement in Vizhinjam protests, I have got 140 cases. Another case is being taken as part of a conspiracy to silence certain people. But we won’t be cowed down by such acts,” he said.
Leader of Opposition V D Satheesan reacted strongly to the police action against Fr Eugine and said by doing so the state government was throwing the gauntlet before the people living in the coastal belt. He urged the government to withdraw the case and alleged that it was the ministers who had started provocation at Muthalapozhi. The bodies of all three fishermen, who had gone missing at Muthalapozhi on Monday, were recovered on Tuesday.