VILLUPURAM: A village panchayat president has alleged lax response on the part of the district administration to the repeated complaints of caste discrimination meted out to her. Panchayat president of Anangur village in Gingee taluk E Sangeetha (40), a tribal woman, filed a formal complaint with District Collector C Palani in July and August alleging that her deputy Chitra Gunasekaran, her husband Gunasekaran and a local DMK branch secretary had been harassing and discriminating against her based on her caste. She had also filed the complaint with other senior officials.
The complaint accused Chitra and her husband of continuously obstructing Sangeetha from discharging her official duties since the time she took office three years ago. “Chitra and her husband refuse to provide me with the digital key (a password) needed to approve salaries and allocate funds for basic amenities like laying water pipes and roads. They also raise my tribal identity to abuse and demean me during public meetings,” the panchayat president said.
“Chitra has openly told me “You, an Irular woman, do not deserve to sit in the panchayat president’s chair”, and threatened to physically harm me if I intervened in administrative matters. I have also been issued death threats. However, the officials don’t take any concrete action on my complaints,” she further said.
Responding to her complaint in August, Collector Palani had ordered an inquiry and directed the deputy president to provide Sangeetha access to the digital key. However, the collector has not directly contacted the victim nor inspected the situation until now.
A month after this, Sangeetha again claimed verbal and habitual caste abuse by the couple, who continued to address her using caste names and asking her to leave during the inspection of NREGA works.
No protest sans permission
On Wednesday, Sangeetha staged a protest at the collectorate demanding action on her complaint. Police subsequently booked her under Sections 223, 292, and 126 (2) of the BNS Act. The district collector had recently issued an order announcing that people staging agitation outside the collectorate campus without prior permission from the police will be arrested.
“We are looking into the issue,” said Superintendent of Police Deepak Siwach when contacted about the case.
Meanwhile, on Thursday night, the collector issued a statement stating that the district administration officials could not find any discrimination in the functioning of the panchayat president. “Photographic evidence shows that Sangeetha had peacefully conducted gram sabha meetings, Republic Day and Independence Day functions in the last three years.
However, based on a personal conflict between the panchayat president and her deputy, the former had lodged a police complaint. Inquiry is underway on that complaint,” the circular said.
The incident has drawn public attention to the recurring caste-based discrimination faced by marginalised communities in the district. Activists have called for a thorough investigation and immediate intervention into the issue by the district administration.