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Manjolai labourers massacre on the Tamirabarani
Seventeen people, mostly Dalit tea estate workers, died in the Tamirabarani river at Tirunelveli while fleeing a police lathi-charge.
Workers of the Manjolai tea estates in the Western Ghats had been agitating for higher wages. On 23 July 1999 a large procession of workers and supporters marched to the Tirunelveli Collectorate demanding the release of arrested estate workers. Police lathi-charged the marchers, and many fled into the Tamirabarani river. Seventeen people, including two women and a two-year-old child, died. The Justice Mohan Commission found that 11 had drowned and the rest died of injuries.
