NE NEWS SERVICE
CHENNAI, SEPT 26
Taking cognizance of a complaint alleging that an engineer was threatening residents of Peters Colony to vacate the tenements, despite the -19 pandemic, the acting Chairperson D. Jayachandran of the State Human Rights Commission (SHRC) on Thursday called for reports from the Housing Secretary and Managing Director of Tamil Nadu Housing Board (TNHB) within five weeks.
TS Muthuselvan, Secretary of Peters Colony Residents Welfare Association, in his complaint alleged that TNHB executive engineer (in-charge) Gandhi was threatening residents of the area to vacate so that parts of the tenements could be demolished to give way for a commercial complex. Further, Secretariat staff, including corona warriors like government servants, frontline health workers, journalists were residing in the colony, the complaint said.
The colony secretary added that when over 50 COVID-19 positive cases were reported in the colony, the Executive Engineer was making phone calls to threaten residents to vacate the tenements. And above all, he was engaging hooligans to force the residents to vacate. The Executive Engineer was also reportedly making phone calls to threaten that he would disconnect the electricity and water connections of these tenements if the residents did not vacate immediately.
It sought a direction to the government to withdraw from the attempts to evict them and to uphold the guidelines issued by the World Health Organisation (WHO) and the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR). As their children were studying in schools nearby and undertaking online classes, the residents pleaded not to force them to vacate until the end of the 2020-21 academic year.
When the residents refused to receive eviction notice in person, TNHB officials sent notices through Registered Post with Acknowledgement Due (RPAD), many of them received during the last two days insisting to vacate on or before September 30.
