Chennai: The Chennai High Court has ordered a stay on the entire investigation into the case registered at the Triplicane police station alleging horse-trading with a TVK MLA.
In the Legislative Assembly, it was alleged that a motion would be brought against Speaker J.C.D. Prabhakar, and that even though he was a member of the ruling TVK party, a deal was struck offering up to Rs. 35 crore as a reward if they acted as instructed during the vote on that motion, TVK MLA from the Uthangarai constituency N. Ilayaraja had filed a complaint with the Chennai Police Commissioner.
Accordingly, in the case registered at the Triplicane police station, 14 people, including YouTuber Thirunavukkarasu from Arumbakkam, Chennai; Naresh from Tiruchi; and Thyagarajan from Medavakkam, Chennai, have been arrested.
In this case, while Ashok Kumar, the brother of former DMK minister Senthil Balaji, has been included, both have obtained anticipatory bail from the Madras High Court.
In this case, Ramesh, who was arrested and later granted bail, had filed a petition seeking an order to transfer the case registered at the Triplicane police station regarding the horse-trading allegations to the CBI. In that petition, the court had directed the Central and State governments and the CBI to respond, and had imposed a stay only on the investigation against Ramesh.
In this situation, Sethu Raj and Karthik, who were granted bail yesterday, have also filed petitions in the Madras High Court seeking that this case be transferred to a CBI investigation and that the CBI be directed to conduct a fresh investigation.
When these cases came up for hearing before the bench comprising Chief Justice Sushrut Aravind Dharmadhikari and Justice G. Arulmugan, the petitioners argued, “We have no confidence in the state police’s investigation, so this case should be transferred to the CBI or some other investigating agency.”
On behalf of the police, it was stated, “There is no need to fabricate a false case. Evidence has been collected.”
Further, on behalf of the Tamil Nadu government, it was argued, “Since the investigation in the case is at an early stage, no interim order should be issued.”
After hearing arguments from all sides, the judges pointed out that the accused persons have been filing petitions one by one seeking transfer of the case to a CBI investigation, and ordered a stay on the overall investigation into the case registered at the Triplicane police station in connection with horse-trading. The judges also adjourned the hearing of the case to August 27.
