TAMIL Malar legal adviser K. Saraswathy is standing by her statement that MIC minister M. Saravanan was involved in the assault on staff of the newspaper by a group of men at the newspaper’s office in Jalan Ipoh on late Tuesday morning.

Saravanan had told the media that he was there to disperse the crowd.

“How can he say that he was dispersing the crowd when he was there from the beginning till end? He was there only three feet away when the thugs went rowdy and started to assault us,” said Saraswathy, who named Saravanan in her police report yesterday. 

The 49-year-old lawyer was at the medical centre across the road from the Tamil Malar office about 11am when she received a call informing her that a group of unknown people were assembled outside the office.

“I was just done with my treatment and was waiting for my medicine when I got the call. So I went there to check it out,“said Saraswathy.

She said there were people grouped together but there was no violence until Saravanan approached the office. It was only then, she said, that the group of people went at her.

It was at this point that newspaper chairman Oms P. Thiagarajan, who was upstairs on the first floor, arrived at the scene.

“We were assaulted. Saravanan was standing nearby. I took my cellphone to take his photos but someone grabbed it out of my hand and threw it away,” said Saraswathy.

Oms was punched while Saraswathy was shoved and had her hair pulled in the fracas that lasted about 10 minutes.

Tamil Malar executive editor S. M. Periasamy said he did not expect Saravanan to behave like a thug or to send thugs to the office, especially after the paper had told him that it would report his side of the story following articles it had published on Selangor MIC.

Tamil Malar on September 3 reported that Selangor MIC had failed to keep tabs on its property as well as table the financial audit of the said property in its recent annual general meeting.

It also published an article saying that a delegate had posed a question on the same issue involving property owned by Federal Territory MIC at the division’s annual general meeting last year.

“We named Saravanan and asked him to account for the rental money collected from tenants of the building. We named him as he is the FT MIC chairman,” said Periasamy.

Periasamy said Saravanan, who was not a happy man as a result, had contacted him yesterday morning to complain that the articles had damaged his image,

“So I told him that the paper would carry out his statement on the front page. We will carry his rebuttal or explanation and I told him that I would call him upon my return to Kuala Lumpur at 1pm,” said Periasamy.

Periasamy said he was on the way to Negri Sembilan when he received the call from Saravanan.

So it was a shock to Periasamy when the fracas broke out before noon the same day as he never expected that a man like Saravanan, who held a high position in the government, would behave like that.

He added that Saravanan could have resorted to such action because he could not rebut the claims in the articles.

“Having leaders at the door arguing with us over our articles is normal. But thugs and physical assault are something new; we are afraid of our safety,” said Periasamy.

He said the newspaper staff had to watch out now, but Tuesday’s incident would not deter them highlighting the issues that affected the Indian community.

“We are not against the government. But we are against the malpractices of leaders, corrupt leaders who fail to channel the funds to the needy Indians and make sure their needs are taken care of,” said Periasamy.

He said police had recorded his statement along with those of Saraswathy and Oms.

The Sun, quoting Dang Wangi police chief Sukri Kaman, said 11 people had their statement recorded, including Saravanan. – September 7, 2017.