7 booked, 2 arrested for assaulting 6 EB staff in Gudiyattam over outage

VELLORE: Gudiyattam police registered cases against seven persons and arrested two of them for assaulting six TNEB staff over power disruption in the town, on Monday. Rain accompanied by heavy wind resulted in trees being uprooted and broken branches falling on power lines led to Gudiyattam town going without power for more than an hour on Sunday night. Similarly, villages including Pakkam Kallur and Seevur also experienced power outages for longer periods. When EB JE Balakrishnan (57) foreman R Ravichandran (60), wiremen A Prakasam (46) and TN Perumal (55), line inspector Sekar (50) and helper Rajkumar were returning after effecting repairs in the Pakkam area, they were accosted by local residents. Though the staff explained that power outage was due to branches falling on power lines, the questioning became a heated argument. When the EB staff neared Chittoor gate area, a group led by one Madan Kumar (36) assaulted them. They were admitted to Gudiyattam GH. Police registered cases against seven, including Madan Kumar and arrested him and his henchman Vinod Kumar (32). Search is on for the absconding 5 others. Gudiyattam MLA Amulu Vijayan, Vellore Aavin chairman D Velazhagan and others visited the injured in the hospital.