Civil society activists on Tuesday urged Chief Minister M.K. Stalin to release four fishermen belonging to Nochikuppam, who have been lodged in Puzhal prison.
A letter signed by eminent persons, including former judge of the Madras High Court D. Hariparanthaman, Carnatic vocalist and writer T. M. Krishna, environmental activist Nityanand Jayaraman, Poovulagin Nanbargal’s G. Sundarrajan, and retired IAS officer M. G. Devasahayam, said that the cases against the four men should be withdrawn.
They also requested Mr. Stalin to allot the promised houses to residents of Nochikuppam and Nochinagar, provide in-situ housing to residents of Loop Road and comply with the CRZ notification by preparing and publishing long-term housing plans for CZMPs that earmark and protect the livelihood of the fishers along the entire coast of Tamil Nadu.
The activists said that any improvement carried out on the Loop Road and the beach there should ensure that the interests of the local fishermen are safeguarded. “The tenements that are the subject of controversy and conflict are 1,188 in number and were constructed under the Pradhan Mantri Awas Yojana – 2015 for residents of Nochikuppam and Nochinagar and their expanded families. However, out of the 1,188 houses, only 108 were allotted to designated residents; 216 were handed to residents from other areas creating conditions of unnecessary bitterness and conflict among fishers,” they said.
In 2020 and 2021, the executive engineer, TNUHDB, rejected housing applications from other villages like Triplicane and Mylapore stating that the 1,188 tenements were specifically earmarked for Nochikuppam and Nochinagar residents. Recently in January, a resolution was passed by the Nochikuppam fishermen panchayat urging the TNUHDB to allot the remaining houses to the extended families of Nochikuppam and Nochinagar. However, only 58 tokens were issued to families of Nochikuppam and the remaining tokens were given to Selvaraj Gramam.
