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N Sathiya Moorthy in Chennai
Upset over the continued denial of land allotted to them in 1981 for constructing houses, 51 Dalit families in southern Madurai district of Tamil Nadu have threatened to join Islam.
They have set a deadline for December 6, coinciding with the death anniversary of Dr B R Ambedkar, for the state government to resolve the issue.
According to the Dalits in Chokkadevanpatti village, they were allotted two cents each by the government and promised funds to build houses.
But barring a notice board that it had been allotted, the authorities had done little to remove the 'occupiers' of the land.
Vellaiyan, 65, says he has exhausted all methods to 'get justice', and failed. He has, therefore, decided to convert.
The 'occupiers', however, most of whom belong to the extremist Piranmalai Kallar sub caste of the Mukkulathore community, say they had built pucca houses on the land long before it was assigned to the Dalits.
They said that they have been paying property tax regularly to the local panchayat [village council] for the past 30 years. They also claim to have some Dalits among them.
The conversion threat comes in the midst of the controversy started by the government's anti-conversion bill that is waiting to clearance from Governor P S Ramamohan Rao.
While the law bans 'forced' and 'allured' conversions, there is nothing in the law to prohibit 'protest conversions' of the type now planned at Chokkadevanpatti.
More reports from Tamil Nadu
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