Chennai, 16 Nov

PMK leader Dr Anbumani Ramadoss on Sunday gave a call for a state-wide "fill the jails" agitation on 17 December, pressing for 15 per cent reservation for Vanniyars within the Backward Classes quota in Tamil Nadu.

He issued a call to his party cadres and Vanniyars, asking them to lay siege to government offices across Tamil Nadu on 17 December, to press the demand for internal reservation for Vanniyars in education and government employment.

Anbumani, in a statement, said that the stir is intended to both register the community’s "pain" and demonstrate its "strength" in the face of what he termed repeated "betrayals of trust" by the ruling establishment.

Recalling the Supreme Court’s 31 March, 2022 order that there is no legal bar on granting internal reservation to Vanniyars if adequate data is gathered, the PMK top leader said the "DMK government could have enacted a Vanniyar reservation law within 27 days of the verdict" but had not done so even after more than 1,300 days.

He said the party initially chose the path of dialogue, believing Chief Minister MK Stalin would move swiftly to implement the quota.

According to him, a PMK delegation met Stalin at the Secretariat on 8 May, 2022, where the chief minister is said to have assured them that a special session of the Assembly would be convened and a Vanniyar reservation law passed before admissions for the 2022 academic year began.

Dr Anbumani also said PMK founder Dr S Ramadoss had also written 10 letters, held 10 telephonic conversations and met the chief minister once in person on the issue, while he himself had three in-person meetings, while senior functionaries had made "at least 50 representations".

"Every time, we were made to believe that reservation would definitely be given," he wrote, adding that the party realised the "true face" of the government when, ahead of the 2024 Lok Sabha elections, it cited the absence of a caste-wise census to state that Vanniyar reservation could not be implemented. He described this as a fresh "betrayal" that continues to cause anguish among party cadres and the community.

Dr Ramadoss alleged that the DMK, despite projecting itself as the ideological heir of the Justice Party that pioneered communal reservation in the Madras Presidency, was in practice "trampling on social justice", particularly when it concerns Vanniyars. He accused the government of trying to "erase even the footprints" of social justice for the community.

He also hit out at the Tamil Nadu Backward Classes Commission, calling it "anti–social justice" and pointing out that although the government had asked it to submit, within three months, its recommendation on reservation for Vanniyars, no report had been given even after about 1,040 days.

While the commission’s term formally ends now, he said, the government has extended it till 16 July next year specifically to obtain its views on the issue, which he termed a "travesty of social justice".

The 17 December agitation, he said, is not confined to PMK cadres but is meant as a platform for Vanniyars "across all parties and movements" who feel wronged by the lack of reservation. He claimed that Vanniyars within the DMK are also "seething with anger" over the government’s stance and need an avenue to express it.

He added that parties, including the AIADMK and the Congress, are in favour of Vanniyar reservation.

Anbumani urged PMK workers to reach out to members of all political parties with pamphlets explaining the objectives of the 17 December protest and to invite them and their families to participate.

The plan, he said, is to hold demonstrations in every Assembly constituency by besieging government offices and courting arrest.

He said the agitation must be of such magnitude that "the prisons of Tamil Nadu will not be enough to hold the protesters" and that the government feels compelled to enact a Vanniyar internal reservation law immediately.