Tamil Nadu govt asked to pay Rs 57 lakh to kin of cracker blast victims
Madurai: The Madurai bench of the Madras High Court on Wednesday passed an interim order directing the Tamil Nadu government to pay compensation of '57 lakh under the ‘Victim Compensation Schemes (VCS)’ to the kin of 18 victims killed in two fire crackers blast at Sivakasi and Thanjavur.
Nine persons were killed in a fireworks accident at Sivakasi town in Virudhunagar district on October 21 and 10 children were killed in a blast at Dhanalakshmi fireworks factory at Mullankudi in Thanjavur on November 1, 2013.
A division bench comprising Justice S. Nagamuthu and M.V. Muralidharan who took suo motu notice of the recent Sivakasi fireworks blast, asked the government to pay the compensation of Rs 3 lakh to each victim’s family through VCS under the provisions of Section 357A of Cr.P.C on or before November 25 and inform the court on November 28.
“You need not wait for the state government to announce the compensation as VCS was introduced by the government only to support such victims,” said Justice Nagamuthu when the special government pleader asked for time stating that the government has already been approached for sanctioning compensation amount under the Chief Minister’s Relief Fund. Virudhunagar SP M Rajarajan also confirmed to the court of inquiry that Rs 4.5 crore is available under VCS in the district.
The court expressed shock when S.P. Rajarajan said, “So far no one was convicted in the case.” He also admitted their inability to punish the culprits because the victim’s family members were not cooperating with the investigation after they received the compensation.
The court allowed the Virudhunagar SP to conduct a thorough probe under his direct supervision and submit a status report to them on November 28.
They also told the SP not to arrest the scan centre owners in the case.
