Chennai: The tension on Royapettah road and in the underbelly of the Royapettah flyover was almost palpable. The tension began on Sunday night following the death of P. Ramkumar and it simmered as a team of doctors waited in vain to do the post-mortem on his body.
The atmosphere was fraught as two groups staged protests through the day. Two JCPs — T.S. Anbu (South) and S. Manoharan (East) and two DCPs — V. Balakrishnan (Mylapore) and P. Saravanan (T.Nagar) — were jointly overseeing the security cover being provided in the area.
A group of VCK protesters gheraoed the mortuary gate of the Government Royapettah Hospital (GRH) demanding a judicial probe led by a Madras High Court judge into the incident.
A little later, the members of the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP), pressed their charter of demands in a rally to the morgue. The shops opposite the mortuary gate of the GRH had to be closed on Monday after the crowd of protesters swelled and threatened the shopkeepers.
A shopkeeper requesting anonymity said that they were not willing to risk their life's earnings by resisting these protesting outfits.
The doctors appointed along with the Judicial Magistrate (Tiruvallur), Tamilselvi waited through the day hoping they would be able to carry out the post-mortem soon after the petition filed by Ramkumar's family is disposed by the Madras High Court.
