SPOTLIGHT

The demands and the responses

T.S. SUBRAMANIAN
RAVI SHARMA

VEERAPPAN has raised 14 demands for the release of his latest hostages. The first set of 10 demands were sent on August 5 in an audio cassette. The second set of four demands, contained in a message signed by the forest brigand, was sent through the offi cial emissary, 'Nakkheeran' R.R. Gopal, who returned from the Satyamangalam forests on August 11.

The second set of demands came just when the Chief Ministers of Tamil Nadu and Karnataka, M. Karunanidhi and S.M. Krishna respectively, had thought that they were nearing a solution to the hostage crisis. The demands were: the Cauvery river water dispute should be referred to the International Court of Justice at The Hague and the Cauvery River Water Authority headed by the Prime Minister should be disbanded; five members of the Tamil Nadu Liberation Army (TNLA), detained under the Terrorists and Disrup tive Activities (Prevention) Act, or TADA, be released (this demand is a reiteration of an earlier one); Tamil be made the medium of instruction up to Class X in Tamil Nadu; and compensation should be paid to women who were raped by Forest Department and police personnel at Vachathi and Chinnampathi villages.

Krishna flew to Chennai on August 11 to discuss the new set of demands with Karunanidhi. Later, at a joint press conference at the State Secretariat, the two Chief Ministers ruled out the possibility of referring the Cauvery water dispute to the Internat ional Court of Justice and the disbandment of the Cauvery River Water Authority.

Responding to the second demand, Karunanidhi said that the Madras High Court had struck down the Government Order making Tamil the medium of instruction up to Standard V and that an appeal from the State government was pending before the Supreme Court. " This is a legal problem. We have to examine whether there is any avenue to make Tamil the medium of instruction up to Standard X," he said. The Chief Minister, however, agreed to release the five TNLA activists.

Reacting to the fourth demand, he said the rape victims had already been paid compensation as per a High Court directive.

On August 6, Karunanidhi and Krishna released in Chennai Veerappan's list of 10 conditions and gave their joint responses to the press.

The demands were: (1) Before finding a permanent solution to the Cauvery river issue, the Interim Award of the Cauvery Water Dispute Tribunal that Karnataka must release 205 tmc ft of water (as per the monthly schedule) to Tamil Nadu should be implemente d. (2) Adequate compensation should be paid to Tamil victims of the 1991 riots in Karnataka over the Cauvery issue. (3) Karnataka should make Tamil an additional language of administration. (4) Karnataka should take steps to unveil the statue of Tamil sa int-poet Tiruvalluvar in Bangalore. (5) Karnataka should take steps to vacate the stay granted by the Karnataka High Court on the proceedings of the Justice Sadashiva Commission of Inquiry, to probe the atrocities committed by the Special Task Force of t he two States. Besides, Rs.10 lakhs should be given as compensation to each of the rape victims and families of the murdered persons, and Rs.5 lakhs to those otherwise affected. (6) TADA detainees in Karnataka prisons should be released immediately. (7) Adequate compensation should be paid to the families of nine Scheduled Caste/Scheduled Tribe persons who were killed. (8) The minimum procurement price for green tea leaves in the Nilgiris should be fixed at Rs.15 a kg. (9) Five persons (belonging to the TNLA) detained in Tamil Nadu prisons should be released. (10) Besides finding a solution to the labour problem in the Manjolai tea estate in Tamil Nadu, the minimum wage for coffee and tea estate workers in the two States should be fixed at Rs.150 a day .

The joint response of Karunanidhi and Krishna was as follows: (1) If there was any problem in providing 205 tmc ft of water to Tamil Nadu, the Cauvery River Water Authority will take appropriate action. The final verdict of the Tribunal will be announced soon. (2) On a directive from the Supreme Court, Karnataka set up the Cauvery Riots Relief Authority in May 1999. The Authority has received 10,000 claims, including 2,000 transferred from Tamil Nadu. The Supreme Court has approved the May 31, 2001 dead line for completion of the Authority's work. (3) As per the Centre's instruction that in areas where linguistic minorities constituted more than 15 per cent of the population, government notices and orders should be issued also in languages spoken by the minority communities. This applies to all States. (4) Both Chief Ministers have agreed to unveil the statues of Tiruvalluvar and Kannada poet Sarvajna in Bangalore and Chennai respectively. (5) Karnataka will take steps to vacate the stay on the Justice Sadashiva Commission of Inquiry. The National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) constituted the Sadashiva commission in June 1999, with retired Judge Sadashiva and C.V. Narasimhan, former Director, Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI), as members. When th e NHRC makes its final recommendations, action to pay compensation to the victims will be taken. (6) TADA charges against the detainees in Karnataka will be dropped, leading to their release. (Fifty-one persons from Tamil Nadu, suspected to be Veerappan' s associates, have been arrested by the authorities in Karnataka). (7) The demand for compensation to the S.C. and S.T. victims will be considered favourably. (8) The procurement price of green tea leaves is rising and has already gone up to Rs.9.50 a kg from the earlier level of Rs.4.50. (9) The demand for the release of five detainees in the Tamil Nadu prisons will be considered favourably. (10) Estate workers in Tamil Nadu already get a minimum wage of Rs.75 a day. If the money spent on their housing , medical facilities and so on are taken into account, the wages would be about Rs.139 a day. Any further rise in wages can be done through negotiations.

Krishna maintained at every press conference in Bangalore that the thought uppermost in the minds of both governments was the safe release of Rajkumar. Karnataka, he said, was doing its best. "It is a sensitive operation, and we have to have patience and perseverance." On who he thought could be behind Veerappan's political demands, he said: "I do not know which forces are at work. We do not know about them. But the Tamil Nadu government has a fair detail of their strengths and weaknesses."

Krishna was of the view that Veerappan's "demands are not that difficult to fulfil". But he was also firm that the brigand's "extreme demands" could not be met. On the demand to make Tamil the second administrative language in Karnataka, he said: "Just a s it is not possible to make Kannada the second language in Tamil Nadu, it is not possible to make Tamil the second language in Karnataka."

Some of the concessions that the two governments have agreed upon can be difficult to fulfil since they have to stand legal scrutiny. One such is the demand that the Karnataka government get the stay on the proceedings of the Justice Sadashiva Commission vacated. On March 27, the Karnataka High Court, acting on a writ petition, stayed the proceedings of the commission constituted to look into the allegations of human rights violations by the Special Task Forces (STFs) of the Tamil Nadu and Karnataka gov ernments.

Prior to the stay order, the commission had held sittings at Gobichettipalayam (near Erode) and Kolathur (near Mettur). It had assembled for a sitting at M.M. Hills when the stay was served on it.

But with the High Court modifying its earlier stay order on August 8, the commission, according to Justice Sadashiva, "can go on with the inquiry and submit a report to the NHRC". He has called for a meeting on August 23. But the NHRC will not be able to take any action on the basis of the report until the proceedings in the High Court with respect to the writ petition are completed.

The Karnataka government's decision to drop the charges against the alleged associates of Veerappan, who have been booked under the provisions of TADA in five cases related to the attack on and killing of STF officials, including a Superintendent of Poli ce (S.P.), the Palar blast and the attack on Gopal, S.P. of Hosur, could land the government in a piquant situation. Karnataka will first have to constitute a TADA review committee. The order of this committee will have to be notified by the government before a petition is filed before the designated TADA court citing the committee's decision to withdraw the cases. What will cause acute embarrassment is the fact that the committee constituted by it in 1999 had ruled that cases related to Veerappan's vi olence were "fit to be tried under the provisions of TADA".