"I Trusted Cops, They Put The Stampede Blame On Me": Vijay In Karur

Tamil Nadu Chief Minister Joseph Vijay came out swinging on his return to Karur — the scene of the September 2025 stampede that killed 41 people shortly before he was to deliver a pre-election speech — with sharp criticism of the police and the opposition Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK).

In his first visit to the district since the tragedy, the actor-turned-politician accused the police of misleading him on the day of the rally. He said he had "trusted" the police in proceeding with the event and described the stampede as "the most painful moment in my life, one that continues to haunt me".

"No matter how much success one enjoys... there are such incidents in life. When I entered Karur they (the police) could have stopped me, no?" he asked the gathering. "They had every right to cancel the meeting. But they did not cancel, they guided me in..." he said.

"Who is really responsible for this... who orchestrated this?" he asked, shifting from criticism of the police to attacks on the DMK, which was in power at the time.

Lamenting the loss of "innocent, cherubic children", the chief minister also hit back at criticism over his silence in the immediate aftermath of the stampede. Vijay and his Tamilaga Vettri Kazhagam (TVK) had come under sustained attack, particularly from the DMK, for not speaking publicly for an extended period after the tragedy.

"You mocked me... when I was feeling crushed and in pain at home, you said I was 'hiding'," he said, before suggesting that his political rivals and the police had "conspired" to trigger the stampede.

"But did the police deploy enough people? They blamed me shamelessly and MK Stalin did politics in the Assembly," he said, reiterating the TVK's claim that the tragedy was manufactured in an attempt to derail the party's eventually successful election campaign.

Vijay, whose film career has earned him a massive fan following across Tamil Nadu, also urged voters to hand the DMK repeated electoral defeats, alleging that the party had indulged in widespread corruption that his government had already begun dismantling.

Apart from marking his first visit to Karur since the stampede, the chief minister's trip has also been overshadowed by legal challenges to the state government's decision to offer government jobs to the families of the 41 victims. The DMK has argued that the move could amount to influencing witnesses in the ongoing probe.

The opposition party approached the Supreme Court last week, but its plea was rejected. "What exactly are you trying to say? You want the court to dictate what a chief minister should do?" the court asked. "Chief Minister Vijay is not an accused."

The DMK later withdrew its plea but approached the Supreme Court-appointed supervisory committee and the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI), which is probing the stampede, seeking safeguards to preserve witness statements before Vijay's visit.

Earlier on Friday, about an hour before the chief minister's arrival in Karur, the Madurai Bench of the Madras High Court refused to interfere with what it described as the Tamil Nadu government's "policy decision" to provide jobs to the victims' families and allowed appointment letters to be issued.

However, the court directed that the appointments would remain temporary and subject to its final verdict in the case.