About 60 enclosures have been created with each possessing the capacity to hold about 400 to 500 people.
Credit: DH Photo/ETB Sivapriyan
Erode: Learning lessons from the Karur stampede that killed 41 people, the Tamilaga Vetri Kazhagam (TVK) is making elaborate arrangements for its first public meeting here on Thursday (December 18) to be addressed by party chief and popular actor Vijay.
The party was forced to change its template of holding road shows to public meetings after the September 27 road show in Karur ended in a disaster when 41 people including 10 children died in a stampede.
TVK suspended all its road shows for about two months before holding a public engagement in a closed environment in Kanchipuram in November.
The public meeting will be held at an expansive 32-acre land owned by the Vijayapuri Amman Temple in Vijayapuram near here on the Kochi-Bengaluru highway between 11 am and 1 pm.
The meeting is being keenly awaited in political circles since this is the first public event in the state after the TVK inducted its first high profile leader in K A Sengottaiyan, who was with the AIADMK for 52 years. Hailing from the western region where the AIADMK is strong and BJP is growing gradually, Sengottaiyan is an asset for the TVK which lacked experienced leaders.
About 60 enclosures have been created with each possessing the capacity to hold about 400 to 500 people. “The attendees will stand and there will be no seating arrangements for them. We expect about 25,000 to 30,000 people to attend the rally. We have installed about 60 CCTV cameras in the venue and ambulances and medical teams will be deployed,” a TVK leader told DH.
District police officials inspected the venue on Wednesday and asked the organisers to adhere to the conditions imposed on them, even as about 1,000 police personnel are likely to be deployed.
Since Vijay’s fans have a habit of dangerously trailing the actor’s vehicle on two-wheelers, TVK has issued an advisory asking them not to follow him from Coimbatore to the venue and vice-versa.
No stage has been erected as Vijay will speak from his specially designed campaign bus that will be parked in the middle of the venue.
“This is what we attempted in Puducherry and it was a success. So we went ahead with a no stage model. The leader will address from atop the bus and leave the venue immediately. We have also asked our cadres to behave themselves,” the leader added.
Adequate arrangements have been made for people to access drinking water and washrooms -- during the roadshow in Karur many people fainted due to dehydration as they did not have access to water for hours together.