Madurai: Villagers of Avaniapuram, Palamedu and Alanganallur, the traditionally main venues for Jallikattu, are a depressed lot today as they feel the police were hostile towards their idea of holding the event come what may.
After the news of the Supreme Court's refusal to deliver the verdict on jallikattu before Pongal spread in these villages by Thursday afternoon, people of Alanganallur gathered to discuss the next course of action but the police prevented them.
“When the apex court had decided to destroy Tamil culture and tradition, why should we follow their orders,” people from Alanganallur village asked.
“When the court issued guidelines for conducting jallikattu in 2010, we strictly adhered to it and the event was conducted peacefully under the direct supervision of the then district collector and superintendent of police,” said Shalini.
“During the last two years we didn't conduct Jallikattu hoping that the court would pass a positive verdict taking into consideration of Tamil culture and tradition. But we learned the hard way that the court would only list to the urban educated elite like PETA to define the rights and wrongs for rural communities,” she said. In a desperate attempt to preserve the Tamil tradition, thousands of youths and jallikattu enthusiasts from across the state have been organising various protests to draw the attention of the Centre.
“Even then, the central government did not take steps to pass a special law in parliament for lifting the ban against a sport which finds mention in many literary works of the Sangam period,” said P Karthik Raj, secretary of Palamedu village committee.
“What the Centre is doing to Tamils now is akin to what colonial administrators did to the natives,” he ventured to add.
Now the Tamil Nadu Government is also attempting to stop us from conducting the event. The police have not only stopped the villagers at Alanganallur from holding a meeting, but they have also started identifying the bulls in these villages.
“After identifying the number of bulls in each village, they would deploy police personnel near the bull owners' houses to prevent us from conducting the event,” said bull-tamers at Avaniyapuram, where the first jallikattu event would usually be organised on January 14. It is learnt that the villagers were secretly planning to organise the sport to show their discontent to apex court.
Dindigul villagers stage protest
The villagers of Pillamanayakapatti staged a protest tying black ribbons on the horns of bulls demanding that the Central Government lift the ban on jallikattu in Dindigul district on Thursday. Hundreds of people in Kodaikanal town also organised a protest.
