Lawyers, techies, refugees join students; PC's office under siege

The on-going agitation by thousands of students in diverse forms in Tamil Nadu over the Sri Lankan Tamils’ issue further intensified on Wednesday, as seething youth got wide-ranging outside support cutting across party and professional lines.

However, barring a few close-shaves of confrontation with the Police, no major incident of violence was reported.

Metropolitan Chennai turned into a major theatre of youth protest, demanding a strong condemnatory resolution against Sri Lanka at the on-going UNHRC meeting for its ‘war crimes’.

It was marked by fasts, rallies and road-rokos by hundreds of college students, including girls in over 50 places across the City.

The agitating students, including from established institutions like Pachaiyappas’ College, Law College and others affiliated to the Left-wing students organisations like Students Federation of India (SFI) and All India Students Federation (AISF), demanded, among other things, an ‘economic embargo’ against Sri Lanka for its ‘genocide’ in the last days of ‘Eelam War-1V’ in 2009.

Students also warned the Centre against “ignoring” their protests. In Sivaganga, home-turf of Finance Minister P Chidambaram, a group of AISF students went on a march to “lay siege” to his local office there, besides that of another Congress MP, Sudarshan Nachiyappan, Police said. 

But an ugly confrontation was avoided, even as the protesting students later dispersed.