00:00And our news from Tamil Nadu, TVK Chief Vijay is set to appear before the Central Bureau of Investigation or the CBI on Monday in connection to the Karu stampede case.
00:11Now Vijay is set to be grilled by the CBI as the probe agency investigates this stampede case that claimed 41 lives on September 27th last year.
00:21The tragedy occurred during an election campaign event by Vijay's party, TVK.
00:26The investigation was handed over to the Central Agency after the Supreme Court ordered a CBI probe into the incident.
00:34Vijay will be quizzed by the CBI tomorrow following a summons that was issued to him by the probe agency on January 6th.
00:42Vijay was summoned in the case as a witness.
00:44He will depart from Chennai tomorrow morning at around 7 and is scheduled to depose in front of the CBI at around 11am.
00:53Ahead of the questioning, he has sought security from the Delhi police for his stay in the capital.
01:00And joining us live from Chennai is India Today's Apoorva Jay Chandran.
01:04Apoorva, this is an important and a crucial questioning because Vijay is being brought all the way from Chennai to Delhi for that.
01:13Now, what can we expect the questioning line to be and what would be the defence that would be the strategy of Vijay?
01:23Well, in fact, what we are getting to learn is that it is going to be, you know, a very chock-a-block day for, you know, TVK chief Vijay tomorrow
01:36as he is all scheduled to go ahead for the summons that has been issued by CBI in the Karoor stampede that had taken place.
01:43Remember, the Karoor stampede, almost over 41 innocent lives had been lost in that stampede that took place there.
01:50This particular stampede in question took place right after the TVK's, you know, election campaign speeches had taken place there.
01:58In fact, Vijay had conducted his campaign speeches in Karoor district,
02:03during which time there were thousands and thousands of, you know, unanticipated crowds who had gathered there at Karoor to witness Vijay speaking.
02:11And in the chaos there, we saw this stampede that had ensued in which, you know, over 41 people had unfortunately lost their lives.
02:19Post this, there had been an inquiry that has been launched by, you know, the Tamil Nadu government.
02:24Not only that, the CBI has also launched the inquiry.
02:27As a part of the inquiry there, tomorrow, the CBI has issued summons for Talapati Vijay, the TVK chief, to go, you know, to come to Delhi for the investigation.
02:36And as per the schedule, you know, Vijay is all set to go to Delhi tomorrow early morning.
02:43His sources do tell us he is likely to depart at around 7 a.m. from Chennai here tomorrow morning and will be reaching Delhi.
02:51There have also been additional security arrangements that TVK, Vijay's party has requested for his protection and security there in Delhi as well at the capital.
03:01Not only that, as a part of, you know, the Karoor stampede incident and the investigation that has been taking place,
03:07the CBI has already called in several people there who were also named in for their alleged involvement in the stampede as such.
03:15And as a part of these investigations that do continue on, it will be Talapati Vijay, the, you know, TVK chief,
03:22who will go ahead and will be called in for questioning tomorrow with the summons that has been issued to him.
03:27Thank you very much. Do stay on with us though, Apoorva. We will be coming back to you for more news.
03:33Now, let's try and look at what exactly happened at Vijay's rally.
03:37There were many lapses that occurred which could be blamed to multiple agencies and to the party itself.
03:43Now, the first lapse that we saw was that the rally venue was too small for the crowd that came.
03:49And remember, there were multiple permissions that were sought for multiple venues, all were denied.
03:55And then this location was given where EPS had also held his rally.
04:00But the crowd that came to the venue was 50,000 people, while that area could only accommodate 10,000 people according to estimates.
04:11So, that is the lapse number two. What is the lapse number three?
04:14Well, keeping in mind that this was Vijay's rally, there should have been sufficient crowd control measures, but they were lacking.
04:21So, who's to blame for that? That is also a question to be asked, not just the administration, but what were the party functionaries also doing?
04:29Lapse number four. There was poor traffic and mobility management around that area.
04:35And this is a question that many people are asking because of that highly constricted place sort of developed where people were pushing against each other.
04:46Now, lapse number five. There was inadequate medical response arrangements in that area as well.
04:53There have been multiple occasions where people have leveled charges against these rally organizers, that there is no water, there is insufficient food.
05:01When somebody gets into a medical situation, then there is not enough done by the agencies over there.
05:10So, these are the questions that are being asked.
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