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Jaya scoffs at TN government's claims on nabbing Veerappan

All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazagham general secretary J Jayalalitha today termed as a "big joke", the Tamil Nadu government's claim that the Special Task Force had surrounded forest brigand Veerappan and his gang and they would be nabbed soon.

In a statement in Madras, she alleged that the elusive poacher could strike again and burgle a police station at Vellithirupur village in Erode district because of the Karunanidhi government's "soft approach" towards him. Karunanidhi had utilised Veerappan to launch a vicious propaganda against her, she claimed, to drive home her point.

The looting of the police station showed how ineffective the DMK government was and that the law and order situation in the state had deteriorated, she said and urged the Union government to act forthwith to eliminate the menace of the forest brigand.

She claimed that during the previous AIADMK regime, the 150-strong Veerappan gang had been reduced to a mere five-member outfit.

UNI

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