In a statement released today, Ms Jayalalithaa said that the DMK party was claiming that the Tamil Nadu government was filing land grabbing cases against the DMK men for political reasons. Ostensibly to to oppose this, the Party decided to hold a fill the jails protest. It was on this basis, that the DMK cadres held protests in front of the offices of District collectors and Taluk offices. The DMK leadership had ordered that those who were imprisoned for participating in the demonstration not to seek bail even if they were put behind bars for several months.

Ms Jayalalithaa stated that the protest organised by the DMK was only to hoodwink the people and divert the steps taken by the Government against the land grabbing complaints made by the general public against the DMK men. The Chief Minister recalled that land grabbing complaints had been given by the public even during the DMK regime. However, since the land grabbers belonged to the DMK party, action was not taken against them. She said after the government headed by her was formed, as promised by her during the election campaign, steps were taken to restore the lands to the persons who had lost their lands because of land grabbing during the previous DMK regime. It was natural that the DMK men who had grabbed the lands were obviously affected.

Ms Jayalalithaa charged that the DMK leadership had announced this protest only to divert attention of the people from the aversion they had developed against the DMK and to cover the corruption charges made against the Karunanidhi family members almost on a daily basis.

The Chief Minister noted that though the Madurai Bench of the Madras High Court had said that preventive arrests of those who participated in the protests could be made, she had ordered the police not to do so. Stating that the protest had been organised to deceive the people, Ms Jayalalithaa said that arresting the protesters and imprisoning them was after all a useless job for the government and for the police department.
The Chief Minister said since it would be useless to lodge them in prisons, she had ordered the police to release the arrested protesters. On her orders all those who were arrested in today's protest had been released, she said.