Actress held for brawl at cinema
Actress Bhuvaneshwari and six friends were arrested for physically attacking a man at the Prathna drive-in theatre on the East Coast Road in suburban Chennai last week.
The theatre allows families to drive in with their cars and watch films in an open air theatre.
The victim Kumar who had come with his family told police that Bhuvaneshwari kept honking and shouting at him to give parking space. When Kumar tried to tell them of the vehicles ahead, Bhuvaneshwari’s male friends got angry and got out and snatched his car keys but returned it after some time.
However as the picture started, Kumar said some men armed with rods and sticks, reportedly brought in by Bhuvaneshwari’s friends, beat him. The men even threatened police who rushed to the scene. The men then escaped through the boundary walls of Prathna theatre.
Earlier Bhuvaneshwari had been arrested for prostitution and other anti-social activities. She has acted in some movies and many television serials.
Tension grips village after caste clashes
Tension gripped a village near Vadulur in southern Cuddalore district last week after eight huts and vehicles belonging to Dalits were torched.
The trouble started when some Dalit youths teased a girl of a higher caste and she complained to her relatives. Immediately 50 men raided the colony at Pacharapalayam village and burnt down television sets, clothes, household appliances and official documents like passports, voter IDs and ration cards.
The district administration rushed to the scene, arrested the miscreants and deployed extra police to prevent further violence.
A fortnight earlier similar clashes broke out in Dharmapuri district when 368 huts belonging to Dalits were set afire because a ‘higher caste’ man had committed suicide after his daughter eloped with a Dalit youth.
MRF founder’s wife dies at 87
Kunjamma, the wife of Mammen Mapillai who founded Madras Rubber Factory (MRF) in the 1950s, died at a private hospital in Chennai.
She was 87 and is survived by two sons and a daughter. Another son had died in 1990.
Kunjamma, who helped her husband start MRF from a small shed as a toy-making unit and building it into a global corporate, always chose to keep a low profile.
She was involved in various philanthropic activities and was a member of the Orthodox Syrian Church’s choir. She had good rapport with corporate employees and was a skilled fund raiser. She continued her welfare work after her husband’s death in 2003.
Born in Kottayam in Kerala to Dr P J Kurien, Kunjamma shifted to Chennai after marriage.
Seven killed in bus crash
Seven people were killed and 50 injured when their Palani-bound bus fell into a 200ft-deep gorge on the road down from Valparai hill resort in Coimbatore district last week.
The bus driver was arrested for speeding and causing the accident. He escaped with minor injuries. The bus went off the road between the first and second hairpin bends, and got caught between two trees reducing the loss of lives. Forest range officers had to get special permission to cut down the trees to rescue the survivors from the dark and dense jungles.
Valparai hill road has 42 hairpin bends and the injured had to be transported in ambulances very carefully.
