On eve of world Tamil meet, Karunanidhi faces lawyers’ protest

Tamil language has become the flavour of the season less than a week before M Karunanidhi’s latest pet project, the World Classical Tamil Conference, kicks off — but possibly not in a way the Chief Minister would have liked.


After pressing their demand for a long time, six lawyers have been on an indefinite fast at the Madurai Bench of the Madras High Court for the past nine days, demanding that Tamil be formally approved as court language. A lawyer in Coimbatore followed suit since Wednesday, while six of their counterparts in Chennai have also announced support and began fast on Thursday, even as the state government reminded the protesters that there was no difference of opinion on the matter.
Taking note of the agitation that is against an existing court order than banned demonstrations of any kind inside the court premises, Chief Justice of Madras High Court M Y Eqbal convened a meeting of seven senior judges, Advocate General P S Raman and members of lawyers’ associations on Thursday to discuss the issue.