Why didn’t Gandhi bathe in Courtrallam despite visiting the Tamil Nadu’s famous water falls once? This was a question in a quiz conducted by the Tamil Nadu Textbook Corporation for students a few months ago. While students gave answers like he had cold among other wild guesses, they were unaware of the real reason behind the refusal - it was to show his opposition to the practice of not allowing Dalits to bathe at the falls then. With the book fair underway, an official shared this story stating that the corporation has released several books in different languages this year including ‘Tamilnattil Gandhi’ which chronicles such interesting incidents.
A sweeping effort
Some prominent BJP leaders had conducted a cleaning drive in Tiruchy city during the visit of Prime Minister Narendra Modi recently. During the PM event at Tiruchy airport, a prominent BJP leader sitting near Tiruchy mayor Mu Anbalagan spoke to him about the sanitation drive. In reply, the mayor asked him on the need for the drive when Tiruchy has sufficient sanitation workers. Interestingly, during the event, union minister L Murugan praised the city’s cleanliness, while Civil Aviation Minister Jyotiraditya Scindia even highlighted Tiruchy as the cleanest city in Tamil Nadu. Sources said that this appreciation brought some embarrassment to BJP leaders who conducted the cleaning drive, but BJP local leaders tried to hide the embarrassment by regarding it as a Clean India awareness initiative. A prominent DMK leader who attended the event jokingly regarded it as BJP’s sweeping victory attempt in Tamil Nadu.
Departments at odds
It seems there is no end to the feud between forest and Tirunelveli district administration. It all started with deciding how many days Ayyanar devotees can be allowed to stay at Sorimuthu Ayyanar temple in the Western Ghats. While the forest department reduced the number of days, the revenue department extended it. Last May, the forest personnel at their check post removed 20 relatives of Manjolai tea-estate workers from a government bus, which was heading towards hilly hamlets. However, the district administration intervened and allowed passengers to reboard the bus. There is also a dispute between the departments over constructing a bridge in Karayar and re-laying the road in the hills. Now, the forest department collecting an exorbitant fare (Rs 150 instead of Rs 22) to transport flood-hit workers in their vehicles. The district administration impounded two forest vehicles as per Disaster Management Act and arranged free van service on Friday. And, on Sunday, a deputy director of KMTR Ambasamudram was transferred.
(Contributed by Subashini Vijayakumar, Thinakaran Rajamani; Compiled by Affan Abdul Kadar)