About 200 transport employees were arrested in Cuddalore and Villupuram districts on Tuesday for defying the police order banning demonstrations.
In Villupuram, mostly employees owing allegiance to the Labour Progressive Front (trade union wing of the DMK), staged demonstration in front of the State Transport Corporation depots at Villupuram, Tindivanam and Ulundurpet.
Those arrested at Villupuram include the LPF district president Selvaraj. They were produced before Magistrate Vignesh Prabhu who directed the police to keep them in judicial custody for 15 days. All of them were then taken to the Cuddalore Central Prison.
Six employees of the STC namely Rajadurai, Perumal, Thirisangu, Parasuraman, Gowthaman and Karmegan were arrested on charges of damaging public property. In both districts bus services were affected for the third consecutive day on Tuesday.
For the past two nights, services to outstation destinations and rural areas were curtailed to a minimum. During the day police protection was given to individual buses or 3 - 4 were run together with police escort.
The limited bus services caused inconvenience to public. The Cuddalore District Collector, S. Suresh Kumar, had made it a point to start his rounds of the STC depots in the district in the early morning.
On Tuesday he inspected depots at Cuddalore, Chidambaram, Manalur and Lalpet.
Mr. Suresh Kumar said that in each depot one manager of the STC and a tahsildar had been posted to keep a tab on the service aspects.
The Collector said that adequate number of drivers and conductors were ready in the depots to provide hassle free services to the commuters.
Villupuram District Collector V. Sampath allayed the fears of the commuters by stating that all possible security arrangements had been made to ensure incident-free bus services. Therefore, the people could undertake their journey with full confidence and without any hesitation.
Meanwhile, State secretary of the Communist Party of India (Marxist) G.Ramakrishnan, who was here to attend the Villupuram district-level party conference, told the reporters that the Ministers and the ruling party MLAs were threatening the trade union leaders with stern action if they continue with the strike. Such an overbearing attitude of the ruling party men was condemnable, he said.
Mr Ramakrishnan called upon the State government to invite all trade unions for talks to find a negotiated settlement of the transport employees’ demands.
No untoward incidents were reported in either of the districts. The trains and private buses were overcrowded.
