Disburse compensation to people affected by STF that hunted Veerappan: MHC to TN

CHENNAI: The Madras High Court directed the State to disburse the balance compensation amount as accepted before the court to the victims and their heirs who faced violence at the hands of the joint special task force of Tamil Nadu and Karnataka police during the operation to nab forest brigand Veerappan.

A division bench of Justice SS Sundar and Justice N Senthilkumar heard the petition moved by the State government challenging the order issued by National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) regarding disbursement of compensation to the victims.

Additional Advocate General (AAG) P Kumaresan submitted that the government has initiated proceedings to identify the beneficiaries and sought three weeks to disburse the amount.

Accepting the submission, the bench closed the petition and directed the Collector of Salem to ensure that the compensation was deposited to the beneficiaries’ bank accounts.

Vidiyal People Welfare Foundation, an NGO, moved a petition before the court alleging that several hundreds of people were severely affected and abused physically and mentally at the hands of the joint special task force during the special operation to locate Veerappan, and sought a direction to provide compensation to the victims and their heirs by the governments of Tamil Nadu and Karnataka.

Following that, a commission was formed under the chairmanship of former judge of Karnataka High Court, AJ Sadashiva, and former CBI director CV Narasimhan. After recording the statements of more than 230 victims, the commission prepared a report, which was sent to NHRC in December 2003.

Based on the report, the commission passed an order on January 15, 2007, to Tamil Nadu and Karnataka governments to grant interim compensation to the victims and heirs.

The representatives of both governments appeared before NHRC and accepted the compensation recommendation and said the governments were ready to provide Rs 5 crore each. However, contrary to their submission before the commission, both governments failed to disburse the full compensation amount to the victims and only provided Rs 1.20 crore.

Hence, the organisation moved another petition seeking a direction to both governments to disburse the balance compensation. On February 7, 2024, Justice Anita Sumanth directed the governments to pay the balance compensation based on the proportion fixed by the commission.

Subsequently, on April 15, 2024, the NHRC issued a notice to the Tamil Nadu government to disburse balance compensation of Rs 3.79 crore. Challenging the notice, the State moved a petition before the High Court.

The State submitted that the single judge has only suggested to fix the balance compensation in the earlier decided proportion, which was misconceived by the NHRC and issued the notice.