Six persons from a Dalit colony in the district, where the marriage of a Dalit boy to a Hindu girl triggered violence in three villages in November 2012, were arrested today and illicit guns and country bombs seized from them, police said.
They said a patrol team spotted the six persons from Natham colony near a burial ground where the body of Dalit youth E Elavarasan had been laid to rest. His body was found on a railway track on July 4 last year.
On seeing the policemen, the six persons tried to escape, but were nabbed and two country made guns and several country made bombs recovered from the spot.
All of them were arrested and produced today before the Judicial Magistrate Court here, which remanded them to 15 days judicial custody. They were later lodged in Salem Central Jail.
Prohibitory orders had been clamped in the village and a strong police contingent posted there as a precautionary measure as various outfits planned to take out rallies on Elavarasan's second death anniversary on July 4, police said.
Meanwhile, relatives and villagers of the six persons gathered before the district Collectorate today and submitted a memorandum to District Revenue Officer P Ramar, demanding that they be released.
The death of Elavarasan on July 4, 2013 had come barely hours after his wife Divya had stated she would never go back to him and would live with her mother.
After appearing for a hearing in Madras High Court in a Habeas Corpus Petition by her mother, she had said she was under tremendous pressure and was unable to forget her father who committed suicide over her marriage.
Her marriage and her father's suicide had triggered violence in three villages of Natham, Kondamapatty and Annanagar on November 7, 2012 when about 296 huts belonging to Dalits were torched allegedly by the caste Hindus.
The violence drew national attention with several political leaders condemning it. 90 persons were arrested a day after the incident and cases registered against another 500 'unidentified' persons.
