Thousands of fishermen and wo-men on October 28 stormed the under construction Vizhinjam International Port by the Adani groups, throwing police barricades to the Arabian sea as the protest entered 101 days.
The more than 1,500 police force remained calm as the agitated fishing community pulled up the police barricades and threw them into the sea, and burned their own fishing boat as a sign of fru-stration.
“Their life has become stagnated, they are starving for the past 100 days and no force can stop their determination,” said Medical Mission Sister Theramma Prayi-kalam, who has stood with the fisher-people’s cause for the past thirty years.
Sister Prayikalam told that the Fisher people are really frustrated as the govern-ment has failed to give them an empathe-tic response so far. “They are not against any development, but only demanding their right to live in their land and continue their profession as fisher folk,” she ex-plained.
One highlight of the 100th day protest was to expand the strike to also Muthala-pozhy, a fresh entrance used by the Adani groups to transport port construction materials, the nun pointed out. Some incidences of violence were reported from the protest on October 28 as fisher people resisted some media groups from covering the event. It was also reported that the women stormed a police officer for manhandling a Catholic priest during the protests.
“We were not violent for past 100 days, and we don’t know what will happen in the days ahead,” a protester told the media persons.
“We are hungry and angry, jobless and frustrated,” cried an aggrieved woman who demanded their right to live and earn a life in their lands.