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EXPRESS NEWS SERVICE
CHENNAI, DEC 28: The trial in the Disproportionate Wealth Case and the Colour Television Case, in which former Chief Minister and AIADMK General Secretary J Jayalalitha has been named as the prime accused, began in the Special Courts I and II today.
Two prosecution witnesses were cross-examined in the court of Special Judge I S Sambandam, in the Rs 66.65 crore case on possession of assets disproportionate to known sources of income.
One of the witnesses, P V Rajaram, said he had sold 3800 square feet of land in Poes Garden in Chennai to Jayalalitha for Rs eight lakh, for which he was paid in three installments by cheques signed by Jayalalitha for Rs four lakh, Rs one lakh and Rs three lakh respectively.
Rajaram said he had purchased the area in 1971 and had let his relatives construct a building on a part of the land. The remaining area, which was to have been looked after by a caretaker, was taken over by encroachers.
Rajaram was unable to evict them, as they demanded Rs 50,000 for moving out of theproperty. Later, a person contacted Rajaram's son-in-law and evinced interest in buying the property.
The unidentified person, who turned out to be Natarajan, husband of Jayalalitha's close friend, asked them to come to Poes Garden where the deal was finalised, Rajaram said.
Jayalalitha's counsel Vridhachalam Reddiar asked Rajaram to identify Natarajan, if present in the court. Rajaram replied that Natarajan was not present.
The judge asked the defence counsel for an accused V N Sudhagaran (Jayalalitha's disowned foster son), to cross-examine the witness, but the counsel said Sudhagaran was accused number three and that cross-examination of the witness could be undertaken by him only after the counsel for the second accused, Sasikala, completed examination of the prosecution witnesses. As she had sought documents in Tamil, there will be a delay before she cross-examines the witnesses.
The second witness, a sub-registrar E V Chakravarthy, had registered the sale of the 1.5 ground land. The prosecutionsubmitted that Chakravarthy had also registered property worth Rs 50 lakh on Mowbrays Road, sold to Lex Property Development Private Limited.
The witness said that the shortage in stamp duty and registration fee was paid for immediately.
The trial was posted to January 27 for further cross-examination of witnesses.
Colour TV Case: In the Rs 10.16 crore case on purchase of 45,302 colour television sets for local bodies, two witnesses were examined in the court of Special Judge II V Radhakrishnan.
The then director of the Adi Dravidar and Tribal Welfare Department, P Sivakumar, said his department was asked to implement the State Government's proposal for installing colour televisions in Adi-Dravidar settlements, having a population of more than 1,000 persons each.
The second witness, Mercy Milton Joseph -- the then Rural Development Secretary-- testified that she was in the post from May 1, 1996 to March 31, 1997.
The Judge posted the case to January 25 for examination of other witnesses.Former Minister T M Selvaganapathy, former IAS officer H M Pandey, former Chief Secretary N Haribhaskar and Sathiamoorthy appeared before the judge. Jayalalitha, N Sasikala, former Minister V R Nedunchezhian and S R Bhaskiran are the other accused in the case.
Trial in the Pleasant Stay Hotel case has already begun in Special Court II.
Copyright © 1998 Indian Express Newspapers (Bombay) Ltd.
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