Border areas limp back to normalcy

After week-long protests over Cauvery issue, normalcy returned the borders of Tamil Nadu with Karnataka. The sate-owned transport's full fleet resumed its bus services to Karnataka with passengers heaving a sigh of relief.

People, especially young IT employees in Bengaluru, who got stuck after they came for vacation, came in large numbers to the Chennai bus terminus and took their respective buses to reach Karnataka.

“We will operate all 49 buses bound for Karnataka,” a senior official from Tamil Nadu State Transport Corporation told DH on Sunday. 

“Ticket reservation services also resumed,” he added.Likewise, the services of Karnataka buses to Chennai were not affected, the official said. 

Apart from the bus services, trucks and private vehicles which were stranded in border areas of Hosur in Krishnagiri district and Sathyamangalam in Erode district, were allowed to enter Karnataka since Sunday morning.

Kesavan, an office-bearer of Tamil Nadu Truck Operators Association, said transport business to the tune of several hundred crores were affected during the last five days since lorries, tempos and even private vehicles which were transporting essential commodities to Karnataka got stuck in the border areas.

However, extra security, which was deployed near banks and other organisations belonging to Karnataka here, was not withdrawn due to precautionary measures. 

With the Cauvery Supervisory Committee meeting in the national capital on Monday to decide on the quantum of the Cauvery water to be released to Tamil Nadu and Puducherry, labourers from the border areas of Tamil Nadu who are working in Karnataka still remain cautious.