Tamil Nadu Law Minister S Regupathy has stated that the report submitted by the Aruna Jagadeesan Commission, which probed the police firing on Sterlite protesters, would be tabled soon. The minister said the report has been sent to the “relevant departments and legal experts for consideration” and that the full report would be tabled on the floor of the house after obtaining their response.
The Commission, set up by the current Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam-led (DMK) government, under Section 3(4) of The Commissions of Inquiry Act, 1952, submitted its final report on May 18, 2022. The government has six months from that date to table the report in the Assembly. The minister’s statement comes in the wake of an article published in The Frontline, which provided details of the 3000 page long report. According to the article, the report has dismissed the claim by the All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (AIADMK) government, which was in power when the incident happened, that the protests had turned violent.
On May 22, 2018, marking the 100th day of agitation against Vedanta’s Sterlite copper smelting plant in Thoothukudi, protesters took out a massive rally. Police personnel, some of them allegedly armed with sniper rifles, opened fire killing 14 people in total including 18-year-old Snowlin. The news article, quoting the Aruna Jagadeesan Commission’s report, said: “There is no material on record to show that it was only to deal with a militant crowd of protesters that the opening of fire was resorted to.” The report also said the firing was “unprovoked” and that police had fired at “fleeing protestors”.
The report also names several top officials as responsible for the deaths, saying that these officials had “exceeded their limits” and asking the government to take action against them for “acts of commission and omission” and to “launch criminal action without prejudice.” As per the article, the names of the officials include Shailash Kumar Yadav (the current Additional Director General of Police, Police Welfare), Deputy Inspector General of Police (Tirunelveli Range) Kapil Kumar C Saratkar (now an Additional Commissioner of Police, Chennai city); Superintendent of Police (Thoothukudi) P. Mahendran (now Deputy Commissioner (Admn), Chennai); and Deputy SP (Thoothukudi) Lingathirumaran. Three Inspectors, two Sub-Inspectors, one head constable and seven constables have also been named in the report. District Collector N Venkatesh, who is now with the National Fisheries Development Board, has also been named in the report.
The commission report also singled out a police constable Sudalaikannu, an “ace shooter,” and cited him as an example of “police’s extra-judicial adventure.
Calls to make the entire report public were made after these details allegedly indicting top police officials were published. Law Minister S Regupathy has also said that based on the Commission’s interim report dated May 14, 2021, the state government took various corrective measures. “Thirty Eight cases against protestors were withdrawn and 93 people who had been arrested were given compensation of Rs 1 lakh each for the trauma they had undergone,” Regupathy said. The statement also said that opportunities for education and employment have been provided for those affected by the cases against them for having participated in the agitation against Sterlite.