SIVAKASI
Over 200 people from Anaiyur, Ayyampatti, Laskhmiyapuram, Gandhi Nagar and Ceylon Colony took out a rally here and submitted a petition at the office of the Revenue Divisional Officer seeking early opening of fireworks units.
Led by K. Saminathan of Ceylon Colony, the villagers took out the rally from Gandhi Nagar to the RDO’s office.
In the petition, Mr. Saminathan said the people of these villages were in the lower strata of economy. Their main livelihood was working in fireworks units. With the cracker units in the district remaining shut from November 12, the workers had been rendered jobless.
The workers said while some of them managed to find odd jobs outside the district, a large number of people were trapped in hunger and poverty.
Stating that hunger could lead to deaths, they urged the district administration to help open cracker units at the earliest.
The villagers also staged a demonstration for a few minutes in front of the taluk office.
Fireworks units were closed after the Supreme Court ordered the industry to produce only green crackers and banned production of joined crackers and use of barium nitrate in fireworks. The units claimed that they could not make crackers in the wake of the court order.
