Tamil Nadu - Cuddalore   

Farm workers’ union chief ‘assaulted’

CUDDALORE: The All India Agricultural Workers’ Union has lodged a complaint with the police alleging that its Vriddhachalam taluk president V.Mathialagan was assaulted by the brother of village assistant of Komangalam panchayat on Tuesday night.

T. Ravindran, district president of the union, said that following the union’s allegations of malpractices in the disbursement of wages under the National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme, Collector Rajendra Ratnoo had arranged for talks on Tuesday.

During the talks mediated by Sivaramakrishnan, accounts officer of the District Rural Development Agency, it was brought to light that there were delayed and non-payment of wages from January to June 2008 to the people of Komangalam panchayat.

Mr. Ravindran said the local body was offering jobs on rotational basis to the Scheduled Castes and Backward Classes living in three habitations. Taking advantage of the system, the officials in charge of disbursement of wages were deliberately adopting delaying tactics.

During the talks it was agreed to cut the delay and make over the arrears by Wednesday. When Mr. Mathialagan went to collect the details of the talks, he was roughed up by Venkatesan (28), brother of the village assistant of the Komangalam panchayat.

Mr. Ravindran said that till Wednesday evening, the officials had not fulfilled the promises of clearing the arrears. Therefore, the AIAWU would chart out the future course of action focusing attention on reneging of promises by the officials and the attack on its leader.

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