Author: Our Special Correspondent
Publication: The Hindu
Date: May 6, 2003
URL: http://www.hinduonnet.com/thehindu/2003/05/06/stories/2003050605210400.htm
Moving scenes were witnessed in
Marad when the Union Minister of State for Home, I. D. Swami today called
on the relatives of the victims of the carnage which claimed nine lives
in Marad.
``We cannot bring back the dead.
But we will do something to help you and your children'', Mr. Swami consoled
a woman whose husband was slain in the Marad beach massacre on May 2.
The woman cried out to the Minister,
``I do not want to live, please take care of my children.''
Similar scenes awaited the Minister
as he moved along the sea-shore to visit other houses on the beach and
meet the grief-stricken relatives of the victims. Many houses remained
closed, Muslim families residing there fled fearing retaliatory attacks.
Swords, long knives and explosives made of empty Pepsi cans were displayed
in front of one such house used as a makeshift police post.
``These were seized from a mosque'',
a youth was heard shouting as the Union Minister went near the cache of
arms on display.
At the Araya Samajam Office, there
were protests against the District Collector, T. O. Sooraj, for refusing
to acknowledge the seizure of arms and ammunition from a mosque in Marad.
The Collector had, in a TV interview,
stated that arms were seized from an `institution' while the Police Commissioner
was shown in a visual in the same channel saying weapons and explosives
were recovered from a mosque.
As tempers rose, the District Collector
who was with the Minister, stated that it was from a mosque the weapons
were seized. The Minister pacified the agitated youth and moved on.
Mr. Swami was heard telling the
distressed womenfolk that he had come to Marad as advised by the Deputy
Prime Minister, L. K. Advani, even though he had to be in Parliament today.
He said he would talk to the Chief
Minister, A. K. Antony, and make a formal request to arrange a job for
at least one member of each of the family which lost a member in the militant
attack.
The Minister reached Marad around
12.45 p.m., driving straight from the airport to the fishermen-dominated
coastal area.
With him were the BJP State president,
C. K. Padmanabhan, and the party general secretary, P. P. Mukundan. The
State president-designate, P. S. Sreedharan Pillai, and the district president,
Sreesan, C. Prabhakaran and Ahalya Sankar were among the party leaders
who accompanied the Minister.
