THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: As many as 7,318 cases have been registered and public properties worth more than Rs 4 crore have been destroyed in the state in the last five years in connection with various anti-government protests, as per the statistics.
According to the assembly records, properties worth Rs 4,01,34,242 have been destroyed in the state in connection with various anti-government protests in the state. The government has also registered cases against present MLA T Siddique and former MLAs K S Sabarinathan, Eldho Abraham and P K Abdu Rabb in connection with these protests. As per the evaluation of the destruction, more than half of the destruction happened in 2017, when Rs 2.04 crore worth of public properties were destroyed.
The state had registered 838 cases, in which there were 4,470 accused for destruction of public properties alone in the said period. As many as 85 accused have been penalized in these cases till now.
The year 2017 had witnessed some intense agitations against the LDF government, particularly when the first Pinarayi government was celebrating its first year in office. The youth organizations of both Congress and BJP, the opposition parties, —Youth Congress and Yuva Morcha— had taken out agitations against the government for “anti-people policies”. The year had also witnessed protests against the GAIL pipeline project, especially in the northern districts like Malappuram and Kozhikode. Close to 100 hartals were called by various political and other non-political organizations in the state citing several issues in 2017. Interestingly, it was not just by the two opposition fronts in the state that came up with protests, but the ruling LDF as well. The LDF had undertaken wide protests against the Centre citing subjects like the beef ban in 2017.
Interestingly, when the anti-government protests were at its peak in the state in late 2018 and 2019, after the Sabarimala verdict and related issues, the destruction of the public properties were comparatively lesser. In 2018, public properties worth Rs 71.61 lakh were destroyed, while it was pegged at Rs 67.08 lakh in 2019. In 2016, the year when the LDF government took over, the destruction was quantified at Rs 31.83 lakh. In 2020, the figures were low compared to other four years, thanks to Covid-19, though even Covid could not fully put an end to such unruly acts. Public properties worth Rs 17.25 lakh were destroyed in 2020, while till August this year, property destruction worth Rs 9.5 lakh has been reported.
As a deterrent, the government in 2019, came up with a law against such destruction, that banned those participating in communal riots, hartal, bandh demonstration, march, processions, blockade of roads or any similar assembly, from destroying public properties. The penal provisions for such acts are imprisonment of five years and a fine.
