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'Peraiyur ritual abetment to murder'

By Our Special Correspondent

CHENNAI Aug. 26 . The Tamil Nadu Child Rights Protection Network (TNCRPN) has demanded the resignation and also prosecution of the Housing Minister, C. Durairaj, for participating in a bizarre ritual, in which children ``were buried alive'' for a while, to propitiate two village deities at Peraiyur near Madurai.

Describing the ritual as ``torture and abetment to murder'', the network expressed shock that despite media coverage, the Government and the Chief Minister were silent on the episode. No action had been taken against the Miniser, the T. Kallupatti union AIADMK secretary, the town panchayat president, the police and revenue officials ``who watched the torture of children''. The Madurai Collector and the SP must be suspended and prosecuted for subverting the law and permitting the practice to continue, the TNCRPN said.

The network said it was well within the Government's constitutional powers to stop the ritual. Many IPC sections were available for prosecuting elected persons and officials who abetted the ``torture'', and the priests responsible for the act.

It called upon the State Women's Commission to recommend action against all those who organised the ritual. The network said the Government's failure to act on this report was a ``serious constitutional violation by the Chief Minister and the Government''. The TNCRPN would organise an educational programme in the village and take a team of doctors there to examine the illness, for which the children were buried, and to study the impact of burying them.

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