Chennai: The Madras High Court Friday orally observed agitations were becoming a full-time profession in Tamil Nadu and wondered how the state economy will prosper if any and every development project was opposed.
Justice Anand Venkatesh made the observations while posting to July 1 a petition by Amma Makkal Munnetra Kazhagam (AMMK) founder TTV Dhinakaran seeking a direction to the police to allow his proposed protest in Cuddalore against a project for extraction of hydrocarbons.
"Protests and demonstrations are becoming a full-time profession now a days in Tamil Nadu," he said, adding opposition to any and every development project that comes to the state would have the direct effect of losing employment to other states.
He also wondered what was the need for organising protests when the state government had already said "no" to such projects.
People should not protest against the project but against the location chosen for it, the Judge said while refusing to accept the contention of the petitioner that Tamil Nadu would turn into a desert if the hydrocarbon project was allowed.
Justice Venkatesh in his oral observations also said most of the people who participate in such protests do so only because political parties organise the agitations.
The participants fail to go into the pros and cons of such projects. The younger generation in the state should be encouraged to seek appropriate profession or job and not to join such protests and movements, the judge observed.
"How the economy of the state will prosper if we oppose any development project that is brought to the state," the judge said.
Dhinkaran along with other opposition leaders, including DMK president M K Stalin, have strongly objected to Oil and Natural Gas Corporation (ONCGC) reportedly seeking the Centre's nod to drill 104 more wells in Cauvery delta region to extract hydrocarbons.
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