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Ramadoss wants satellite town proposal dropped

Special Correspondent

"Thiruporur proposal will affect farmers in at least 40 villages" He is of the view that such a measure should not inconvenience long-time local settlers

VILLUPURAM: Pattali Makkal Katchi leader S. Ramadoss has urged Chief Minister M. Karunanidhi to drop the proposal to set up a satellite town (for Chennai) at Thiruporur.

Though Dr. Ramadoss acknowledged the need for setting up satellite towns to ease the demographic pressures, he was of the view that such a measure should not inconvenience long-time local settlers or affect farmland.

Addressing a press conference at Thailapuram near here on Thursday, Dr. Ramadoss said the proposed town would dislocate people and affect farming in at least 40 villages. The Karunanidhi government, which was keen on handing over two acres to each landless farmer elsewhere, should not displace the Thiruporur farmers. It could acquire fallow land in Thiruvallur and Kancheepuram districts or on the Chennai-Bangalore highway.

The PMK stand on the satellite town was akin to the one taken against the AIADMK regime's proposal to shift the Secretariat and should not be construed as politically motivated, he said. It would not put the government in a tight spot on this score.

He would organise a seminar on `reservation in the judiciary' in New Delhi in September. Retired judges, constitutional experts, social activists and senior journalists would participate.

Dr. Ramadoss said his forthright views on reservation for Other Backward Classes in Central educational institutions might differ with others, but it should not give place to any conjectures that the differing stand might churn up the present political set-up.

He said the PMK was not pursuing any political agenda as was being made out.

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