2018 Sterlite firing: Madras High Court says police acted at behest of ‘one particular industrialist'

The Madras High Court on Monday observed that it believed that the 2018 police firing at the Sterlite copper plant in Thoothukudi that killed 13 unarmed people was a pre-determined act carried out by the authorities at the behest of "one industrialist"..A Bench of Justices SS Sundar and N Senthil Kumar also said that the Tamil Nadu government must investigate if the officers involved in such agenda received any monetary gains."All these things happened because one particular industrialist wanted it to happen. You (police and district authorities) all acted on his behest. He wanted to teach the people a lesson and you facilitated it. Any place where 100, 200, or, 500 people gather routinely, should they now start doing so with fear that they might lose their lives any day? Can the court shut its eyes to this?" the High Court said..It, therefore, directed the State's Directorate of Vigilance and Anti-Corruption (DVAC) to probe into the assets of all the officers including IPS and IAS officers who were posted in Thoothukudi at the relevant time, arrayed as respondent parties before the Court in the present case..The 2018 protests were against the Sterlite copper plant, a unit of Vedanta Limited. The Sterlite plant was the largest copper smelter in the country until its closure in 2018. At the time of the incident, the protestors had been demanding that the plant shut down as it was causing environmental damage to the area..The Court was hearing a petition filed by activist Henri Tiphagne seeking that the probe into the incident conducted by the National Human Rights Commission (NHRC), which was closed on October 25, 2018, be re-opened.Tiphagne had filed the petition in 2021 challenging the NHRC’s decision to abruptly close its suo motu probe into the incident..While hearing the case today, the Court said,"One should actually assess the assets of the respondent officers. We want to know where their current assets stand at. One of the protestors was shot less than seven kilometers from the collector’s office. We suspect some of the police officials have let the firing happen out of an agenda. Hence, an inquiry by vigilance and anti-corruption of the State must be initiated against the assets of the police and government officials arrayed as parties here and were working at Thootukudi at the relevant point of time. Assets not just in their name but also in the names of their wives, close relatives to be collected and produced before this Court. From two years prior to Sterlite incident and two years hence."It directed the DVAC to initiate such probe and file a preliminary report within two weeks.