
MADURAI: Alleging discrimination during the Palamedu jallikattu event, the Ambedkar Paraiyar Uravinmurai from Palamedu handed a petition to Madurai Superintendent of Police B K Arvind on Monday, seeking action against the functionaries and members of the Palamedu Grama Pothu Mahalingam Madathu Committee for preventing SC persons and their bulls from participating in the event on January 15.
The group’s president C Santham said jallikattu events were held in villages on the second day of the Thai month. While the committee must give respect and invite people from all communities, SC community members were not invited in such a manner.
Santham filed a petition before the Madurai Bench of the Madras High Court, and based on the court order, the district collector organised a peace talk between the SC members and the committee members.
During the peace talks, it was noted that there are 22 communities in the village, of which members of 11 communities were part of the jallikattu committee. Further, there are temple bulls from six communities (temple bulls are released from the Vaadivasal and are not tamed during the event as a mark of respect).
It was discussed during the talks that such respect should also be extended to a temple bull from an SC community. One Chandrasekar, hailing from an SC community, petitioned the collector on January 7, 2024, seeking to release a bull belonging to the Karuppu temple. However, the committee members refused to allow the release of the bull belonging to the SC community.
A fresh petition was then submitted before the Madurai Bench of the Madras High Court, and the court directed the district administration to consider the petition, before disposing it. The district administration agreed to stick with the 2024's peace talk decision.
However, the committee members were firm and refused to give respect for the bull owned by the SC community, and also prevented the bulls owned by SC members from participating in the competition. In light of this, Santham demanded the police to book a case against the committee functionaries and members under relevant sections of the SC/ST Act and the BNS.