Five people were arrested by the Crime Branch-Criminal Investigation Department (CB-CID) for vandalising YouTuber Savukku Shankar’s house. The arrests were made on Wednesday, March 26.
The accused have been identified as Selva, Kalyan, Vijay, Bharathi and Devi. However, after the arrest, Savukku accused the CB-CID of "hoodwinking people" and named five others claiming that they are the real accused. "Vanishree, Jayakumar, YC Ragavan, Royapuram Mani, Nungai Sreenivasan. These are the real accused. They all were present in the scene of crime," he wrote on X (formerly known as Twitter).
Savukku Shankar’s house was vandalised on Monday, March 24, by a group of individuals who entered the premises under the guise of sanitation workers. The attackers poured sewage water, ransacked the house, and verbally abused both Savukku Shankar and his aged mother.
While the police said that the attack was in retaliation to Savukku’s comments on sanitary workers, the Madras Corporation Red Flag Union, representing sanitation workers, has denied these allegations.
Savukku Shankar, in a YouTube video alleged that Tamil Nadu Congress Committee State President and MLA K. Selvaperunthagai had procured sewage cleaning vehicles distributed by Chief Minister MK Stalin under his nominees' names. "If someone told these sanitation workers that they don't need to do any work and yet will be paid Rs 50,000, they can drink and stay at home, won't they like it? All that they need to say is that the vehicle belongs to them," Savukku said in the video.
Videos of the attack show that those who vandalised his house were referring to this statement of his.
Savukku Shankar also alleged that Selvaperunthagai and the police including the Greater Chennai Corporation Commissioner A Arun were complicit in the attack. The case was therefore handed over to the CB-CID.