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Auto driver from Avinashi drives COVID victims to hospital for free

An auto driver from Avinashi in the Coimbatore district is gaining a lot of praise for taking the corona virus victims to the hospital in his auto for free. Avinashi in Tirupur district has been seeing a rise in corona infection and the Chevoor village has been especially affected.

As people are struggling to get an ambulance, Basheer Mohammad (A) Siraj (36), a resident of Thevarayampalayam area near Avinashi, takes the corona victims to the hospital in his auto free of cost.

“I come from a very poor family. I wanted to help the public in the coronavirus pandemic. I have been working with the ‘Avinashi COVID Joined Hands’ organization to deliver kabasura kudineer and other medications to remote areas.” he was quotede saying in a Tamil newspaper.

He continued: “Currently, people with corona are being asked for absurd amounts of fares by auto drivers, even the shortest distances in an ambulance, to go to the hospital or home. In particular, private ambulances are asking up to ₹5,000 to take the infected to Avinashi-Tirupur. So, I have been taking corona infected patients in my auto for free.”

He went on to say, “It is these situations that make us realize that life is very short. So I do this with the intention of living with humanity in my lifetime. In the Avinashi, Chevoor area, I am taking the victims of the coronavirus to the hospital in my auto for free. You can contact me at 99942-68319 anytime, 24 hours a day”

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DMK’s Twitter account hacked?

The Twitter account of DMK Virudhunagar seems to have been hacked with its account getting renamed as “TE$L’₳”.

The account had also replied strangely to the tweet of ‘Elon Musk’.

BJP spokesperson SG Suryah in tweet shared an image of the strange tweets of DMK Virudhunagar and took a jibe at Finance Minister Palanivel Thiagarajan who is also the head of the party’s IT wing.

Anchor of Tamil News channel associated with evangelist Mohan C Lazarus peddles Hindu hatred, says ‘all Union Ministers are idiots’ on air

Aravindakshan, an anchor at the Tamil news channel Sathiyam News, made derogatory statements against Union Ministers during a live debate.

Sathyam News is owned by Paul Devaraj Isaac Livingstone and has close ties with controversial Christian evangelist Mohan C Lazarus.

During the debate titled “Will komiyam (cow’s urine) cure corona?“, anchor Aravindakshan can be seen making provocative remarks towards BJP Tamil Nadu spokesperson Narayan Thirupathy.

The anchor starts off by asking one of the panelist who is supposedly a ‘doctor’ whether if common people would start drinking cow’s urine after listening to speeches of certain leaders to which the ‘doctor’ goes on to make unsubstantiated claims about how a person died by putting lemon juice in his nose after listening a BJP leader.

He then goes on to ask BJP spokesperson Narayanan Thirupathy if whether the government has given proper guidelines on what is to be done/not done for containing the disease. Narayanan Thirupathy objects to the title of the programme and lashes out at the anchor for painting a communal colour and provoke disharmony by keeping such vulgar topics. He also points out how in their channel they broadcast discourses of Mohan C Lazarus for propagating irrational stuff like ‘Jesus will cure corona’.

To the anchor saying about BJP MP Pragya Thakur claiming that she had drank cow’s urine, Narayanan Thirupathy responded that it was not the Government of India’s position and that it was an individual’s matter of faith. He also pointed out instances where Congress leader Digvijay Singh had claimed that he drinks cow’s urine.

Narayanan Thirupathy also came down heavy on leaders like VCK chief Thol. Thirumavalavan for peddling fears about vaccine by linking vaccination with Actor Vivekh’s death who had died of heart attack.

For this, a visibly disturbed anchor starts yelling at Narayanan Thirupathy justifying the VCK chief’s remarks.

The anchor further goes on to make false and baseless claims peddling anti-vaccine rhetoric saying that people are being made to sign a exemption/non-liability clause at vaccination centres. It is to be noted that no such signatures are received at government vaccination centres.

The anchor further yells at the Narayanan Thirupathy and goes on to make statements about ‘Gayathri Mantra’, a Hindu religious verse while accusing the BJP spokesperson of communalizing the debate.

Pointing out at the instance when former IAS officer and Union Minister Arjun Ram Meghwal had obliged to launch a papad that claimed to boost immunity against corona virus, the anchor goes on to say that the Government of India has ‘clowns’ as Ministers.

The anchor further goes on to say that the government has let the people to fend for themselves and claims that nothing has been done by the government to contain COVID.

As the spat goes on, BJP’s Narayanan Thirupathy condemns the anchor for giving such a ridiculous title to the debate to which the anchor arrogantly keeps repeating that “I will keep the title like this only” while going on to accuse Narayanan Thirupathy of spewing hatred.

The visibly agitated anchor further goes on to yell, accuse and intimidate the BJP spokesperson saying that the latter was talking lies ‘shamelessly’.

In the 2nd round of the debate the anchor provokes the BJP spokesperson saying that the latter was speaking with ulterior motives to which Narayanan Thirupathy responds back saying that he will call out the debate that has been titled ‘idiotically’. The anchor can be seen further provoking the BJP spokesperson by saying that if he can listen to ‘clowns’ (hinting at BJP Ministers) he can surely  listen to him. Narayanan Thirupathy retorts saying that it was him who was acting like a ‘clown’ by keeping such stupid titles.

The anchor further goes on to take jibes condescendingly on the BJP spokesperson and says ‘Yes. Let your pressure shoot up. Get more tensioned. Keep talking.” to which Narayanan Thirupathy says that he is tired of talking to an idiot.

“Yes sir. What to do! What can be done if all Union Ministers are idiots!”, anchor Aravindakshan says.

When Narayanan Thirupathy says that titles should be chosen carefully for debates, the anchor yells back saying that he will keep titles like this and he is not ‘obliged’ to take directions from him.

“You take your job of giving instructions to somewhere else. Not here”, the anchor condescendingly says.

The anchor further goes on to ask unrelated questions like why did the government allot money for studying ‘Gayathri Mantra’ to which Narayanan Thirupathy gives it back saying why are subsidies being given for Hajj and Jerusalem trips. Narayanan Thirupathy lashes out at the anchor for communalising and for deliberately hurting religious sentiments of Hindus.

Clipping of this debate has gone viral on social media where many have condemned the condescending attitude and for his communal debate.

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Police couple donate entire month’s salary to help those in need

A police couple near Kodaikanal Road have donated groceries for a month to the orphanage for the helpless on their one month salary. Anbalagan is the Chief Constable of the Ammayanayakkanur Police Station near Kodaikanal Road in Dindigul District. His wife Selvarathnam works as a Chief Constable at the Vilampatti Police Station.

The couple, who usually make small donations, decided to help people affected by corona damage and curfew. The two discussed and decided to spend their one month salary for this.

Following this, the two bought groceries, vegetables, essentials and bedsheets, including a month’s worth of rice, from their paychecks and donated them directly to the old age home and mentally challenged children’s home near Ammayanayakkanur.

The humanitarian work of the police couple was appreciated by all. The Dindigul DIG, Muthuchamy, who came to know about this, thanked them, and said, “I knew these people were already involved in public service. I wondered if they were serving because they had no children. But when questioned they have two sons. It takes a big mind to look after the children’s expenses and help out.”

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DMK Govt notifies to acquire temple land for crude oil refinery in Nagappatinam

The Tamil Nadu government’s Department of Industries has issued an advertisement for land acquisition to build a crude oil refinery.

The land to be acquired includes 2.37 acres of land belonging to the Agastheeswarar Swamy and Srinivasa Perumal Swamy temples in Narimanam, Nagapattinam district.

The notice states that a 9 MMTPA crude oil refinery of the Chennai Petroleum Corporation Limited would be set up in the Narimanam Village in Nagapattinam district. It has called the land owners of these respective survey numbers to notify their objections with the District Revenue Officer within 30 days of publishing the notice. It also says that petitions of the land owners would be dismissed if objections are not registered within 30 days or if the petition does not in the required format.

The Madras High Court had earlier issued a stern order that the temple land should not be used for any purpose other temple development work.

It’s worth noting that the entire 2.37 acres are agricultural property. The DMK, when it was in opposition, was a staunch opponent of methane and gas projects. But now, it is not only acquiring agricultural land but also setting up a crude oil refinery in the temple land. It is also noteworthy to mention that the earlier AIADMK government had declared the Cauvery delta zone as protected zone where only industries related to agriculture can be set up.

Devotees and the general public have demanded that the DMK government respect the court’s order and Hindu sentiments by dropping the proposal to acquire temple land.

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No vote, No vaccine? Netizens, leaders allege DMK is taking revenge on Kongu region by not vaccinating its people

On Friday (May 21), Coimbatore saw 3243 new cases of Wuhan virus getting reported, next only to Chennai which saw 5913 new infections.  The district stands second with 29345 active cases while Chennai tops the list with 48782 active cases.

On the other hand, the district fares extremely poor in terms of vaccination. Only 172 doses were administered on Friday. From May 15 to May 21, a total of just 4714 doses were administered in the entire district. In the same period, 22453 cases of Wuhan virus were reported.

It is not that the state does not have any vaccines with it. As of May 18, Tamil Nadu had a total of 13,63,494 doses of vaccines in its kitty. It had received 9,62,000 doses on May 16 from the Union Government.

In light of this, leaders from opposition parties and the people have alleged that the DMK is discriminating Kongu region in vaccination.

Coimbatore South MLA Vanathi Srinivasan said that the western belt is being neglected with regards to vaccination. She said that there has been negligible vaccination in the district for the past two days. She has urged the Health Minister to take action immediately.

BJP MLA candidate from Ooty expressed strong condemnation towards the DMK government for discriminating the people of Nilgiris and Coimbatore. He said that in Coonoor, no vaccines are being administered for the past three days. “Everyday I’m following up with GH personnel and they give me the same response that no vaccines have been supplied. Extremely poor distribution plan by the state.”, Bhojaran said.

Prof. P. Kanagasabapathi, the State Vice President of BJP Tamil Nadu has said that despite repeated appeals, there has been no respite for Coimbatore people and that there has been no vaccination since yesterday (May 20). He has written a letter to Chief Minister MK Stalin to intervene and address the issue at the earliest. In his letter he stated that the COVID positivity rate of Coimbatore is higher than that of Chennai and that hospitals are turning away thousands of people wanting to get vaccinated citing they don’t have vaccine stock. He has asked the Chief Minister to allocate sufficient vaccines to the district.

AIADMK spokesperson Kovai Sathyan  said that there is no logic or mathematical model that is being followed by the present Tamim Nadu government. “They are just randomly distributing the vaccines in an arbitrary manner”, he said.

“Just because they got wiped out in the region, it seems that the DMK is purposefully not rolling out beneficial schemes for the public of the region as they don’t want the MLAs of the region to take the credit.” Kovai Sathyan said.

BJP Spokesperson SG Suryah lashed out Stalin-led government and called it a cruel, blatant injustice and discrimination being meted out to the people of Coimbatore. “I don’t know if it is sheer incompetence and mis-governance of the present state government or whether they are doing it purposefully as they got wiped out in all 10 constituencies of Coimbatore. A government has to be a government for all. Are Coimbatore people not Tamilians?”, Suryah said speaking to The Commune.

BJP Tamil Nadu Vice President K. Annamalai also questioned the government over the poor vaccination roll out for Coimbatore. He said that vaccination in the Kongu belt has been on the decline since May 10.

“Total vaccination done in the state on May 19 was 36,199. Total Vaccination in the 5 districts of western region (Coimbatore, Erode, Nilgiris, Salem, and Tirupur) is just 2244. This is just 6% of the total vaccination done for the state on that day. It clearly shows that the region is being neglected.”, he said.

“Is this political pay back for not electing DMK representatives here? Or is it sheer political and administrative mis-management?”, Annamalai asked.

It is to be noted that Tamil Nadu is dealing with a dual problem of vaccine wastage and vaccine hesitancy. Thanks to Tamil news channels, irresponsible politicians like VCK chief Thol. Thirumavalavan and self-proclaimed experts on everything under the sun like Sumanth C Raman, vaccine hesitancy has been high in the state after they raised questions about the safety of vaccines following Actor Vivekh’s death. While Actor Vivekh died of heart attack, the rhetoric peddled had led to unwarranted fears among common people. It needs to be mentioned that the same people who spread fear have got themselves vaccinated.

On top of this, netizens and leaders allege that political preferences of people seem to be having a role in the vaccine distribution by the DMK government. The hashtag #DontBoycottCoimbatore is trending on Twitter.

https://twitter.com/PraneshRangan/status/1395764032838070282

https://twitter.com/Jeyankumari/status/1395788490609025034

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DRDO’s 2-DG medicine works effectively against virus: Doctors

Testing of the 2-DG drug developed by DRDO and Dr.Reddy’s Lab to treat Corona was held at Chengalpattu Government Hospital.

The 2-DG drug is prepared in powder form to be mixed with water for corona patients. The drug was approved for testing after it was found that the molecules in the drug worked well against corona. At the end of the testing performed in 3 stages, it was reported that the drug was effective in oxygen-dependent corona patients. Following the test results, the Drugs Controller General of India has approved the use of 2-DG for emergency use.

Doctor Vinod who tested 2-DG in Chengalpattu GH said, “The number of covid cases in India was high last year. To address the problem, DRDO collaborated with Dr. Redddy’s lab to create a molecule that was effective against corona. Glucose is usually needed for the virus to multiply in the human body. When a 2-DG drug enters the corona-infected human body, the molecules in the 2-DG drug appear as glucose to corona virus and combines with it. Consequently, the 2-DG drug completely stops the virus from multiplying.”

He further added, “The central government chose 20 Corona centres, including Chengalpattu GH, across India to test the 2-DG drug. The drug was put to the test for the past six months, and 110 patients were tested. Patients who had taken 2-DG took a maximum of 10 days to recover. The drug cuts the length of stay in the hospital, say from eight to four days. The drug can also be given to controlled diabetic patients. Furthermore, this drug should only be taken under the supervision of a doctor.”

(with inputs from Thanthi Tv)

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PTR becomes a part time troll: After Jaggi and The Hindu’s Malini, engages in spat with former Infosys director

P.T.R. Palanivel Thiagarajan, the Finance Minister of Tamil Nadu who had earlier called Sadhguru Jaggi Vasudev a ‘publicity hound’ and a ‘charlatan’ has now gone an abusive rant against former Infosys director and Padmashree awardee T.V. Mohandas Pai.

Mohandas Pai had shared a video on his Twitter timeline on May 21 where he had called Palanivel Thiagarajan as a ‘loose mouth’, ‘arrogant’, ‘self-centred’, ‘abusive’ and ‘egoistic’ for his comments on Jaggi Vasudev.

“Can he shut up and do his job?” Pai wrote on in his tweet.

Following this, Palanivel Thiagarajan responded to the tweet calling Mohandas Pai a ‘capitation-thieving’, ‘genetically-bigoted’, ‘biggest-global-beef-merchant’ and a ‘hypocrite’. He had also shared pictures of audit reports to substantiate his claims of alleged environmental violations of Isha Foundation.

To this, Mohandas Pai retorted back at Palanivel Thiagarajan saying that he had a bigoted mind was devoid of dignity.

The spat came to an end with Palanivel Thiagarajan blocking Mohandas Pai.

Palanivel Thiagarajan has been in the news for the last few days for his comments on Jaggi Vasudev over the latter’s clarion call for freeing temples from state control.

In his interview to The Hindu which was published on May 14, Palanivel Thiagarajan dismissed the call for relieving Hindu temples from government control and went on to make defamatory statements on Sadhguru Jaggi Vasudev.

““Random people make random noise. These are the people who want to break the goodwill of society,” he told The Hindu.

“In the case of Jaggi, he is a publicity hound and charlatan who is trying to find another angle to make more money.” he further added. He had also called Jaggi Vasudev a ‘commercial operator’ pretending to use god and religion to get help.

In response to this, volunteers of the Isha Foundation had written an open letter to Palanivel Thiagarajan saying that they were appalled at the personal attack made by a person holding such high office. The letter further stated that Isha Foundation has worked with various elected governments from across the political spectrum and will continue to do so for the welfare of the people of Tamil Nadu.

The Hindu Publishing Group’s Chairperson Malini Parthasarathy had shared this response which The Hindu had carried in the form of an article. However, Tamil Nadu Finance Minister Palanivel Thiagarajan resorted to shooting the messenger saying that Malini Parthasarathy needs ‘counselling’ and not destroy The Hindu’s brand.

 

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Electricity bill burns a hole in Chennaites pockets amidst lockdown and frequent power cuts

At a time when household incomes have fallen short owing to the state government imposed lockdown in view of the raging second wave of the Wuhan virus pandemic, residents in Chennai have been shocked with high electricity bills. Consumers who usually receive a monthly bill in three digits have received exorbitant bills in 4 digits.

“I a vegetable and fruits trader at the Koyambedu market. I have had no income for the past few weeks. It is becoming difficult to manage finances at home. On top of that they send a bill amounting to more than ₹5000. How am I supposed to pay this?”, laments Sathya, a resident of Anna Nagar, Chennai.

Another resident of Porur who makes a living by working as a domestic worker has received a bill amount of more than ₹4000. “I have 3 children to take care of and a very old mother-in-law. Work is also not stable due to the lockdown and corona cases. Many are asking me to not come to work. Yesterday I had received ₹2000 money from the ration shop. It has now gone into paying this bill.”, she says.

Kokila from Saidapet who also works a domestic worked has received a bill of ₹2000 while her average monthly bill is around ₹700-800.

“On one hand, there has been frequent power cuts for the past 10-15 days. On the other hand they take away whatever little we earn away. The joke is one us.”, says Kokila.

Another user whose house has been locked for the past three months has received a bill of ₹2704. “This is the bill they gave for a locked house. I am in my native now and I can’t go back to Chennai.”, he said.

 

The reason for the high price is that consumers are being asked to pay the highest amount they paid in the year 2020. Also, people are also being made to pay an additional security deposit.

“This comes at a time when many are scrambling for their lives and livelihood. Powercuts have also increased after the DMK came to power. Why is this amount being charged now without considering the plight of people? Why are they so inhumane?” said Karthikeyan, from Arumbakkam.

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China builds new strategic highway close to Arunachal Pradesh

india china galwan clash border disengagement

As China keeping developing its infrastructure in Eastern Ladakh it has also completed building a strategic highway close to the Arunachal Pradesh border, reports Economic Times.

The strategic highway has been constructed by China through the Yarlung Zangbo Grand Canyon which is the world’s deepest gorge with a maximum depth of 6009 metres at a cost of $310 million without any concern for environmental impact.

The 67.22-kilometer-long highway connects Pad Township in the Chinese city of Nyingchi with the Baibung Township in Medog County. This highway will cut the travel time between the two towns by eight hours.

The highway also includes a 2.15-kilometre-long tunnel and the construction of the highway had begun back in 2014 when India had barely had any infrastructure due to the policy of the Congress government which believed not to antagonize China.

The altitude difference between the highest and the lowest spots of the highway is as high as 2,892 metres and Medog is the last county in Tibet located close to Arunachal Pradesh as China tries to open a new conflict front against India.

China still claims Arunachal Pradesh as part of its own territory which India has strongly rejected.

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