Maharaja TV employee abducted in Colombo

[TamilNet, Friday, 01 September 2006, 10:26 GMT]
A Tamil woman, employed in the computer section of the Maharaja Televion (MTV), was abducted Friday around 7:30 a.m. in Wellawatte, Colombo. Six armed men, riding in a white-van, abducted Thavarajah Thavamani, 26. More than 10 Tamil civilians, including three females, have been abducted in Colombo city and its suburbs during the past week alone, humanitarian sources said.

Ms. Thavarajah Thavamni, the niece of Colombo district UNP MP T.Maheswaran, has worked for the Maharajah Group of Companies, was blindfolded and abducted, 200 meters away from her house on Vivekananda Road in Wellawatta in south of Colombo, the victim's mother has complained to Wellawatte Police.

Thavamani, a native of Karainagar, Jaffna, is an engineer by profession. She had recently joined MTV and was attached to the Central Bank of Sri Lanka prior to her employment in MTV.

MTV Channel telecasts MTV English, Sirasa TV in Sinhala and Shakthi TV in Tamil with separate channels for each of them. MTV is owned by Maharajah Organisation Limited, one of the largest privately-held corporation, in Sri Lanka. The group also operates four FM radio channels.

A News manager of another leading private media group, the Asian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC), Nadarajah Kuruparan, was abuducted Tuesday morning and released Wednesday, after being blindfolded and interrogated for 20 hours.