In another attack on Sri Lankans in Chennai, three men from Sri Lanka were allegedly assaulted by members of a pro-LTTE group, their T-shirts ripped off and burnt in Perambur late Wednesday night.
The police arrested three members of the Naam Tamzhilar movement, Raj Kumar, 40, an area secretary of Naam Tamzhilar at New Washermenpet, Mahendran, 25, and Karthikeyan, 38, of Vysarpadi, in connection with the incident.
“The accused threatened the three Sri Lankan pilgrims who were shopping at Perambur when they saw writing in Sinhala printed on their T-shirts,” a police officer said. “They made them remove their T-shirts and set them on fire.”
“Eighty-four pilgrims from Elpitiya in Sri Lanka’s Galle district had come to India on July 17 on a pilgrimage to Bodh Gaya and were scheduled to return to Sri Lanka on Friday.
After visiting Kasi and Rameshwaram, the pilgrims returned to the Sri Lanka Maha Bodhi Centre building on Keneth Lane in Egmore where they were staying.
Since the rooms were full, they were put up in a lodge in Perambur,” said a monk at the society. He said the pilgrims would be sent back home safely on Friday.
“It is humiliating to be treated like this in India. We dreamt of going back with good memories but unfortunately this incident has put paid to that,” a pilgrim said.
Mahanama Thero, a senior monk at the Maha Bodhi Centre, told Deccan Chronicle, “The Sri Lankan deputy high commissioner in Chennai, Vadivel Krishnamoorthy, has assured the pilgrims that they would be sent back to Sri Lanka safely.”
An attack on the Maha Bodhi Centre on January 24, 2011, left several people injured. - The Deccan Chronicle