Pro-jallikattu stir brings Chennai, other TN cities to a standstill

Chennai was shut down on Friday as protesters took to the streets, demanding lifting of the Supreme Court ban on the traditional bull-taming sport of jallikattu.

The demonstration since Tuesday fuelled by online social media platforms went up several notches in intensity today, with trade unions, traders associations and the youth calling a State-wide bandh to reiterate their demand.

Political parties too joined in, with the DMK staging a rail blockade, while film stars were on a silent protest.

Life was thrown out of kilter, with public and private transport vehicles off the roads and schools, colleges and shops shut.

Police stayed on the sidelines as bands of youth took to the streets on motorcycles shouting slogans, waving placards and flags in support of jallikattu. What started out as a slow day with sparse traffic on the roads segued into chaos within a couple of hours as endless crowds descended on Marina Beach, the hub of the protest.

The crowd of several thousands that maintained a vigil day and night at the Marina Beach swelled several fold as busloads of people joined in.

Main roads such as Anna Salai and Radhakrishnan Salai leading to the beach were choked with traffic most of the day. Traffic police watched from the sidelines.

The demand intensified even as the State government announced that it would promulgate an ordinance with the Centre’s support within a couple of days to conduct jallikattu. The Tamil Nadu government assured that it will amend the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals Act (PCA), 1960, through an ordinance to enable the conduct of jallikattu within a couple of days.

Tamil Nadu Chief Minister O Panneerselvam issued a statement that at his meeting with Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Thursday, the latter had assured him that the Centre will support any legal measures by the State to conduct the traditional sport.

Later in the evening on Friday, the Centre moved an ordinance to amend the PCA to allow jallikattu events to be held across the State. The ordinance will now move to President Pranab Mukherjee for assent.

The Tamil Nadu governor will then be able to promulgate the ordinance, enabling the conduct of the traditional sport which had been banned by the Supreme Court in 2014, the Chief Minister said.

This year, the ban on jallikattu has evoked an unprecedented response from youngsters across the State, who came together using social media platforms.

Over the last four days there have been widespread agitations across the State and in Chennai, where thousands of college students and young professionals have camped at the Marina Beach.

College and school students and youth in the southern districts, particularly Madurai, where jallikattu is popular, and in other major towns and cities including the Union Territory of Puducherry have come together, protesting the ban.

The protesters’ stand is that the sport associated with the harvest festival Pongal in the southern districts, is a mark of traditional and cultural identity of the Tamil people.

The Chief Minister has urged the protesters to give up the agitation as the government is taking steps to conduct jallikattu within a day or two.

For an agitation of this type it was novel to see entire families, middle aged women and girls participating in it.

Subhadra Kannan, an advocate and a mother of two, participated in the protest along with her children and families of friends.

Ezhil, a father of two, said: “I wanted them to understand why the jallikattu protest is important. My parents moved to Chennai and we went to our village every year for Pongal. My children should also know about all this.”

HipHop Tamizha, a Chennai-based pop group started by Adhithya ‘Adhi’ Ramachandran Venkatapathy and R Jeeva, has been trending in most social media platforms today — even more than #jallikattu — after the group released a video ‘Takkaru Takkaru’ supporting jallikattu that went viral.

PTI reports that though political parties have been kept away from the ‘youth uprising’, main opposition party DMK staged a State-wide rail roko agitation, with party leader MK Stalin leading the protests by squatting on tracks in Mambalam.

Stalin and Rajya Sabha MP Kanimozhi besides many DMK workers were arrested.

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