Kerala capital Thiruvananthapuram will fall into the grip of State and Central police forces on Monday as the Congress-led Government is determined to use all means available to it to quell the CPI(M)-led Opposition lDF’s ‘historic’ agitation demanding Chief Minister Oommen Chandy’s resignation over his alleged role in the infamous solar scam.
Over 5,000 police personnel — including 20 companies of CRPF personnel — in riot gear complete with grenades and rifles will take control of all the roads leading to the State Secretariat, the nerve centre of State Administration, which is expected to come under siege by over 100,000 lDF workers from Monday. The determination of the Government to defeat the agitation is so hard that policemen would examine the nooks and corners of even private homes in the city and around it to ensure that agitators do not get accommodation in the garb of guests. Hotels and lodges in the city and around have been instructed not to rent rooms or halls to lDF workers.
Anxiety is on the rise among the people of the capital district, especially those in Thiruvananthapuram city, as the police have begun unprecedented preparations to face the agitators. The Government has already declared that Monday and Tuesday would be holidays for the educational institutions in Thiruvananthapuram district. The Government has already instructed the police to block lDF workers at the entry points to the capital district, to use force for this if need be and to cancel the permits of vehicles bringing agitators into the city despite the repeated assertion by lDF leaders that their agitation would have no element of violence.
The Government has also instructed the State-run Kerala State Road Transport Corporation to reduce its long-distance bus services by 30 per cent. Home Minister Thiruvanchoor Radhakrishnan alleged that the Opposition’s move to paralyze State administration was part of a bid to trigger internal strife. Instructions have also been given to the police to take leftist leaders into preventive custody. On Friday, the police issued notices to 18 area committee secretaries of the CPI(M) in Thiruvananthapuram district to appear at the Cantonment Police Station. lDF leaders said the Government was over-reacting with an ‘undeclared Emergency’.
Alleging that Chandy was misusing the State police and Central forces in order to ensure his survival as Chief Minister, Deputy Opposition leader Kodiyeri Balakrishnan said that the Government was creating undue provocation but added that no amount of force would be able to defeat the agitation. “The Kerala Government is now adopting measures that are not being used even against banned extremist outfits to defeat the Opposition stir. Chandy is trying to counter this movement using fascist methods. let the Government bring in as much police force as it can but it won’t succeed in defeating this movement,” Kodiyeri said.
The Congress party is accusing the Opposition of trying to overthrow a democratically elected Government through its agitation but the lDF claims that its aim is not to overthrow the Government but force Chief Minister Chandy who has been accused of involvement in one of the worst scams Kerala had seen to resign.