TN This Week: CM Launches Monthly Aid Scheme Providing Rs 1,000 to Women

The DMK government’s flagship scheme of Rs 1,000 monthly financial assistance for women was rolled out on Friday by Chief Minister M K Stalin on the birth anniversary of Dravidian movement leader C N Annadurai.

In a historic first, three young women in Tamil Nadu who successfully completed training to become priests will soon be designated as assistant priests at temples in the state, breaking a long-standing male-only tradition.

AIADMK general secretary Edappadi K Palaniswami participated in the National Democratic Alliance meeting in New Delhi on Thursday. It is being seen as an attempt by his party to firm up ties with the BJP for the upcoming parliamentary elections.

In a long-pending demand to implement Government Order 293, issued in June 2021 and ensuring speciality allowances, around 100 government doctors staged a dharna on the Directorate of Medical Education and Research campus on Wednesday.

A second case of students refusing to eat food cooked by dalits came to the fore this week. Nine out of 11 students of a government primary school in Thoothukudi refused to eat food provided under the state’s breakfast scheme. A similar incident was reported last week in Karur.

A dalit woman, elected as the president of the Nayakaneri panchayat in Tirupattur district in October 2021, is yet to be sworn in by the district administration even after almost two years after being awarded the certificate of election. Read more

Construction workers staged a rally from Egmore to the Tamil Nadu Secretariat in Chennai on Wednesday to grab the attention of the state government. They demanded that the government implement the decisions taken by the Tamil Nadu Construction Workers’ Welfare Board (TNCWWB). Read more

The All India Democratic Women’s Association held a state-wide protest on Tuesday demanding that the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA) scheme should be strengthened and extended to urban areas. Rad more

NewsClick brings you a round-up of the important developments from the state in the past week.

DENGUE SCARE

The Tamil Nadu Health Department has launched a drive to control mosquito breeding after a four-year-old boy in Chennai died of dengue, officials said on Monday. Tamil Nadu has reported a total of 4,048 cases of dengue in eight-and-a-half months this year.

In the midst of curbing dengue, Tamil Nadu took measures to prevent Nipah virus after cases were found in Kerala. On Wednesday, Tamil Nadu's Directorate of Public Health and Preventive Medicine said that the passengers coming from Kerala will be screened at the border check posts.

RAMPANT RAIDS

The Enforcement Directorate conducted searches in over 30 locations in Tamil Nadu as part of investigations into cases linked to the local sand mafia.

ED also conducted raids on a close aide of Tamil Nadu Minister Senthil Balaji, who is an accused in an alleged cash-for-jobs scam.

The Directorate of Vigilance and Anti-Corruption (DVAC) on Wednesday raided multiple locations linked to B Sathyanarayanan, AIADMK’s former MLA from Chennai’s T Nagar constituency on charges of possessing disproportionate assets accumulated from 2016-2021. 

ARR CONCERT

Music maestro A R Rahman's concert in the suburbs of South Chennai on September 10 turned into a stampede-like situation. The Chenni and Chengalpet police, as well as the event organisers, were called out for mismanagement. Chief Minister M K Stalin’s convoy was also reportedly stuck in the traffic jam.

People who spent thousands of rupees on tickets were stuck in traffic for several hours and were unable to attend the overcrowded concert. Women took to social media to allege that they were molested in the crowd. This was a wake-up call to reconsider the metropolis’ insufficient infrastructure.