Puducherry CM suspends his dharna

Puducherry Chief Minister V Narayanasamy on Monday night "temporarily" called off his six-day long dharna outside the Raj Nivas after Lt Governor Kiran Bedi agreed to some of his demands.

The breakthrough came at a six-hour long meeting between Bedi, Narayanasamy, his ministerial colleagues and bureaucrats at the Raj Nivas here. After initial dithering, the two agreed to meet on Monday evening to thrash out a solution to all the issues confronting the Union Territory.

After emerging from the meeting, the senior Congress leader told reporters that the LG has positively responded to some of his demands. "She has agreed to reconsider the decision of closing down cotton mills in the UT. The LG has also agreed to allow paying of old age pension for 10,000 beneficiaries to start with," Narayanasamy said.

"So, we have decided to temporarily call off the dharna," the Chief Minister announced. His dharna had received support from DMK and even rival AAP, whose convenor and Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal flew down to Puducherry.

The CM had sat on a dharna on Wednesday after the LG implemented compulsory helmet rule at one go against the government's decision of implementing it slowly.