Passions continued to simmer in Kerala while VS Achuthanandan and M Karunanidhi were agreeing to disagree in the Mullaperiyar dam issue at New Delhi today. In contrast to the relative quiet in Tamil Nadu, thousands of people fasted and protested at six different places near the dam and along the river Periyar feeding it, while a joint conclave of Tamil and Malayalam writers in Thekkady appealed to both sides to keep public interests and concerns in perspective. The protests included, among others, by the BJP which marshalled hundreds of its workers and dam activists who plunged waist-deep into the Periyar and formed a symbolic "human check dam', demanding that the dam's safety be evaluated by an expert international agency. Another slogan chanting group of 101 local mothers held a daylong fast a little away, not far from where men from almost an entire village squatted through the day, in their own protest fast.