Law College students' strike corners law around Parry’s

By Gokul Vannan and G Saravanan

Published in The New Indian Express, Chennai, on August 19, 2010:

CHENNAI: A sudden strike called by students of Dr Ambedkar Government Law College here on Wednesday inconvenienced the public, as they paralysed the bustling commercial hub of Parry’s Corner and surrounding areas by putting up road-blocks and preventing people from even walking on the road.

Agitating students checked motorists and pedestrians from using the road. On Beach Road, the students booed and abused an elderly woman who wanted to cross the road and take an autorickshaw to her home in Perambur. She was made to wait for two hours under the sun.

The students prevented motorists from driving along the road. Some even chased the two-wheeler riders, forcing them to get down and push the vehicle to the other side of the road.

When a group of people confronted the students asking why there were being harassed, they retorted, “You will know the pain only if someone in your family dies”.

Commuters at Parry’s terminus found themselves stranded as no bus could depart. MTC buses moving from Central and northern parts of the city were stopped at Central railway station, while buses from the southern side came up to the RBI.

Lawyers too were stopped from proceeding on the roads that were blocked. An advocate, coming in his vehicle from Chennai Central side, pleaded with the students to let him reach the High Court to argue an important case. The students said he could walk to the court if he wanted.

In a bid to sort out the matter, a set of people — some of them stuck at the bus-stand for more than six hours — approached the police, who maintained silence even as the students raised slogans mocking the police.

After facing the wrath of the public and forced to relax the road blockade to an extend, the students were at one point in an apparent quandary as to how to continue the agitation when S Prabakaran of Tamil Nadu Advocates Association and R C Paul Kanakaraj of Madras High Court Advocates Association called on them.

While Prabakaran extended support to the protest and demanded action against the police, Kanakaraj asked the students to accompany him to meet the Chief Justice.

So the protest, which seemed petering out around 4 pm, suddenly picked momentum with Prabakaran’s support. The students once again put up road-blocks on the three junctions.

Only two hours later did they withdraw the protest. That was when the HC ordered the filing of an FIR against the police personnel who allegedly harassed S Ashok Kumar, whose reported bid to commit suicide at the Chengalpattu Medical College Hospital on Tuesday night, had created the chaos on the roads.