The incident of fecal waste being mixed into a school drinking water tank near Ayyalur in Dindigul district has caused shockwaves across Tamil Nadu.
A government higher secondary school is functioning in Thangamapatti, near Ayyalur in Vedasandur taluk, Dindigul district.
More than 300 students are studying there. A Sintex drinking water tank has been installed at the school for students to use. Fecal waste was found inside that drinking water tank, wrapped in a plastic cover.
Also, a warning note had been written and kept inside that envelope. On that note, the letters had faded, and the words “those who destroyed our residences” had been written.
While Vadamadurai police are investigating this matter, we have received several shocking pieces of information.

When the people of Thangamapatti spoke to us about this issue, they said, “At the place where the high school now stands, 13 families had been living for the past 25 years. When the work to build the school began, some members of those families were given alternative land, but four families were not given any land, so they have been living near the school.
Now that a compound wall is being built around the school, they have no way to go out and come back in, so they have been fighting for the past two years to be provided with alternative land by the government.
Even the note found in the bin had only the words “Warning to those who ruined our family” written on it. Because of this, the police are questioning them,” they said

When asked about this, those families said, “Our children also study in that school. If we mix feces into it, our children will be the ones drinking that water too. We would never do such a lowly job. Some teachers in the school administration have been trying to force us to vacate this place.
We have also filed a complaint at the Vadamadurai police station about the teachers coming here frequently, threatening us to leave, and even trying to attack us. On the day the feces was mixed into the drinking water tank, we went along with CPM party members and met the Dindigul district collector to submit a petition requesting land be allotted to us.
We suspect that the teachers themselves did this just to get us expelled. They did this to trap us in this matter and even to belittle the struggle we have been carrying on all this time,” they said.
