At least 36 people were killed and more than 50 injured in a stampede at a rally in Tamil Nadu in India held by actor Vijay, who is campaigning for election, the chief minister of Tamil Nadu said.

Chief Minister MK Stalin said eight children and 16 women were among the 36 people who died in the district of Karur in Tamil Nadu during a political rally by Tamilaga Vettri Kazhagam, Vijay’s party.

Earlier, state lawmaker Senthil Balaji told reporters that 58 people were hospitalised.

Vijay, one of Tamil cinema’s most bankable actors for three decades, has drawn massive crowds to his public meetings since launching his political party, Tamilaga Vettri Kazhagam, in 2024, which has targeted both the state ruling party DMK and the Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party.

He is campaigning ahead of state elections that are to be held in early 2026.

Videos from local media show thousands of people surrounding a large campaign vehicle on top of which Vijay is seen standing and speaking.

During the rally, visuals showed Vijay throwing water bottles from the top of the vehicle to fainting supporters and calling for police help when the crowd became uncontrollable.

“My heart is broken; I am in unbearable, indescribable pain and sorrow,” Vijay wrote on X.

The unfortunate incident during a political rally in Karur, Tamil Nadu, is deeply saddening. My thoughts are with the families who have lost their loved ones. Wishing strength to them in this difficult time. Praying for a swift recovery to all those injured.

— Narendra Modi (@narendramodi) September 27, 2025

“I express my deepest sympathies and condolences to the families of my dear brothers and sisters who lost their lives in Karur. I pray for a speedy recovery for those who are undergoing treatment in the hospital.”

At least 44 doctors from the nearby districts of Tiruchirappalli and Salem were sent to Karur, media reports said.

Mr Stalin has announced 1 million Indian rupees (€9,600) each to the families of the victims who died in the incident and set up an inquiry panel.

This is not the first time Vijay’s rallies have faced safety concerns. At least six deaths were reported by media following the first meeting of his political party when it was launched in October last year.

Despite police-imposed restrictions, including limits on convoy size and venue changes, the sheer scale of public turnout has repeatedly overwhelmed local infrastructure.

“The unfortunate incident during a political rally in Karur, Tamil Nadu, is deeply saddening,” Prime Minister Narendra Modi said in a post on X.

More than €4 million in Government funding to the childcare sector is set to be returned due to a delay in ratifying an already-agreed 10 per cent pay increase for the more than 30,000 workers in the sector.

The money represents about 10 per cent of the €45 million in ring-fenced funding to support pay in the early years sector which was allocated in last year’s budget.

The funding year for the sector runs from September 1st and the money was to be allocated evenly across 52 weeks.

It means the failure to ratify the agreement reached by representatives of owners and staff at the start of the summer after a Joint Labour Committee (JLC) process, overseen by the Labour Court, is holding up the implementation of the increases and resulting in the loss of €865,000 in public funding per week.

Speaking at Siptu’s early years sector conference at Liberty Hall in Dublin on Saturday, Minister for Children, Disability and Equality Norma Foley said she wanted to see all of the money provided by Government to the sector reach it and was particularly anxious to see the pay and conditions of staff improve but “the JLC is an independent process and I have to respect that”.

She told delegates she hopes the process of implementing the deal would be completed “within weeks”.

Siptu’s Darragh O’Connor said the loss of funding had been caused by delays on the employer side in agreeing the deal. “It’s not the first time that has happened – the previous deal took over a year to conclude. We need these deals to be concluded in good time so educators don’t lose out like this.”

Ms Foley said the Government remains committed to the targets set out for the sector in its programme, including the reduction of fees to parents to €200 per month, but the scale of progress made in this budget would depend on the amount of funding made available to her department.

Negotiations are understood to be continuing between Ms Foley and Minister for Public Expenditure Jack Chambers, with one meeting having taken place last week and another scheduled for the coming days.

[ Budget 2026: Norma Foley to consider relief proposals for parents paying highest creche feesOpens in new window ]

Ms Foley said she was pleased to see that supports introduced by the previous government meant many parents on low incomes were now paying rates at or below the OECD average for childcare but she was conscious that for many on middle and high incomes there were still instances of “very high fees”.

It was reported earlier this week in The Irish Times that the budget is likely contain measures intended to particularly help those families paying the highest amounts in fees, and Ms Foley also mentioned those with three or more children as being potentially among the most hard-pressed at present.

In addition, she said, “it is the intention that we drive forward with the public model while recognising the great service that is provided by those who are the private providers.”

Siptu’s Diane Jackson said the union wanted, among other things, to see the State’s first publicly operated early years service open next year. Its assistant general secretary, John King, said Ms Foley should spark a “Donogh O’Malley moment” by transforming access to early years the way her predecessor as minister for education had with secondary education in 1967.

She said the Government continues to see public-run services as part of the anticipated future mix and as a tool to address geographical shortages but she could not put a time frame on any roll-out.

Also at the event, her predecessor as minister for children, Roderic O’Gorman, urged her to move forward immediately, saying: “I know from experience that if you want to see results in years three, four and five, you have to act in year one.”

US President Donald Trump said he was directing Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth to send troops to Portland, Oregon and to protect federal immigration facilities against “domestic terrorists”, saying he was authorising them to use “full force, if necessary”.

A deployment in Portland – the largest city in Oregon – would follow similar moves by the Republican president to mobilize troops against the wishes of local Democratic leadership in Los Angeles and Washington DC.

It also comes as Mr Trump launches an assault against left-wing activists in the wake of several deadly attacks, which the president and his allies claim are evidence of a “domestic terrorist” network.

Mr Trump said in a social media post that he was directing Mr Hegseth “to provide all necessary Troops to protect War ravaged Portland, and any of our ICE Facilities under siege from attack by Antifa, and other domestic terrorists”.

The move follows on from Wednesday, when a gunman who wrote “ANTI-ICE” on an unused bullet killed two detainees and wounded another when he fired on an Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) field office in Dallas from a nearby rooftop before taking his own life.

Portland Mayor Keith Wilson, responding to Mr Trump’s order today, said: “The number of necessary troops is zero, in Portland and any other American city.

“The president will not find lawlessness or violence here unless he plans to perpetrate it.”

In a press conference yesterday, Mr Wilson and other local leaders urged calm in the face of an apparent influx of federal officers that the mayor said did not come at the request of the city.

“This may be a show of force, but that’s all it is. It’s just a big show,” he said.

US Senator Ron Wyden, a Democrat from Oregon, wrote on X that Mr Trump “may be replaying the 2020 playbook and surging into Portland with the goal of provoking conflict and violence”.

In 2020, protests erupted in downtown Portland, the Pacific Northwest enclave with a reputation as a liberal city, following the killing in Minneapolis of George Floyd.

The protests dragged on for months and some civic leaders at the time said they were spurred rather than quelled by Mr Trump’s deployment of federal troops.

Trump focuses on crime and ‘Antifa’

On Thursday, Mr Trump told reporters that “crazy people” were trying to burn buildings in Portland.

“They’re professional agitators and anarchists,” he said, without providing evidence,” he said.

Mr Trump last week signed an executive order that declares the anti-fascist Antifa movement a domestic “terrorist organisation” as part of a crackdown on what he claims is left-wing sponsored political violence.

According to US law enforcement, there has never been a terrorist incident in the United States connected to Antifa.

Mr Trump first sought to designate the movement as a domestic terror organisation during the nationwide George Floyd protests.

The most notorious episode involving the movement occurred in Portland in August 2020, when Michael Reinoehl, a self-identified Antifa supporter, shot and killed Aaron “Jay” Danielson, a member of the far-right group Patriot Prayer.

Mr Reinoehl was killed by federal and local law enforcement officers during an attempt to arrest him.

The US president has made crime a major focus of his administration even as violent crime rates have fallen in many US cities.

His crackdown on municipalities led by Democrats including Los Angeles and Washington has spurred legal challenges and protests.

The Trump administration’s goal of deporting record numbers of immigrants living in the US illegally has framed the push around criminals, but it has arrested many people without criminal records.

Residents in New York, Chicago, Washington and other Democrat-leaning metropolitan areas have pushed back in recent months.

In the Chicago suburb of Broadview yesterday, ICE used tear gas, less-lethal rounds and pepper balls to quell protests outside an immigration detention center.

Protests have also occurred outside other detention centers around the country, including in Portland.