Subhashri death: Book officials and politicians for murder, urges 'Traffic' Ramaswamy

Ramasamy had filed a contempt petition with the Madras HC in 2018 over Tamil Nadu government’s failure to check illegal hoardings despite a court order banning them.

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Social activist ‘Traffic’ Ramasamy has sought action against those responsible for the death of Subhasri, a 23-year-old engineer, and has filed a complaint at the Pallikaranai police station. Subhasri was killed on Thursday afternoon as a hoarding on the median of the road fell on her vehicle, throwing her on to the road before she was run over by a tanker lorry.

In his complaint, Ramasamy has urged the police to register a case under Section 302 (murder) of the IPC against the errant officials – ‘concerned police officer, corporation department official and the ruling party persons who have permitted or erected the banned illegal banner..which caused murder of one innocent young lady today’. His complaint comes hours after Subhasri was killed in an accident involving a hoarding mounted on the median for the wedding of an AIADMK functionary S Jayagopal. The hoardings erected on the Thuraipakkam-Pallavaram radial road were reportedly put up without necessary permissions from the authorities and a court order mandating prior permission from the authorities.

In 2017, the Madras High Court ordered a ban on digital hoardings and banners with images of living persons on them. In 2018, Traffic Ramasamy had moved a contempt petition in the HC against the Chief Secretary of Tamil Nadu for failing to implement the court’s order on unauthorised digital banners. Hearing the petition, Justice M Sathyanarayanan and P Rajamanickam issued an interim order restraining political parties from erecting digital banners till further orders. The order also stated that unless the government of Tamil Nadu give an undertaking that the rules and orders related to banners will be strictly implemented, no political party shall put up digital banners.

In June 2019, the HC warned of initiating contempt proceedings against the Tamil Nadu Chief Secretary over non-compliance of the court’s orders on digital banners. The court had observed that the menace of illegal digital hoardings continues despite the orders of the court and a pending contempt petition filed before it.