Cain and Abel
It seems as if the DMK's fight with the Jayalalitha government is actually all about showing which of the two sons of DMK chief M. Karunanidhi — M K Stalin or M K Azhagiri — has more clout within the party. When Stalin was detained/ arrested in Tiruvarur, it triggered off a DMK backlash all over the state. Good for him to have the cadre rally around him because he needs to show who is boss when the local party elections come around in October.
It all began when police stopped Stalin’s convoy to arrest Tiruvarur DMK secretary Poondi Kalaivanan for allegedly preventing students from attending school last Friday as an offshoot of the DMK’s protest against the Jayalalitha government for not implementing samacheer kalvi (Uniform Syllabus System of Education). His arrest this week, after the protest called by the DMK against the Jayalalitha government for "foisting" land grab cases against DMK cadre, also had the party rallying around with at least 40,000 courting arrest.
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The two brothers present a marked contrast in the way they deal with issues. While Stalin has taken the "democratic" route of organizing protests, Azhagiri, characteristically, has chosen the maverick route. Azhagiri, despite being a union minister, visited his "friends" in jails in Madurai and Palayamkottai in Tirunelveli. And if that was not enough he sped down from Madurai to Poolavari village in Salem district last week to see Veerapandi Arumugam, a former minister, against whom three land grab cases have been registered.
Although Karunanidhi reportedly wanted to take part in the land grab protests, he was told that since he did not have age or health on his side, he should sit it out. Karunanidhi has been reduced to conducting a statement- war or a question-answer conversation through the pages of the DMK mouthpiece, Murasoli. He has accused the Jayalalitha government of "vendetta politics" and "foisting" cases against partymen. Jayalalitha has maintained that they are "genuine complaints filed by persons with no political backing."
Jayalalalitha’s government issued an order approving the setting up of 36 anti-land grabbing special cells in the state. Of these, one is at the police headquarters, seven at commissionerates and 28 in districts. The government has sanctioned Rs 20.02 crores that includes a recurring expenditure of Rs 12.51 crores and non-recurring expenditure of Rs 7.51 crores.
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All of Azhagiri's Men
Azhagiri has managed to stave off arrest but many of his aides are in jail. There’s talk this his wife, Kanthi, might be booked in a land grab case. Police say it’s investigating many complaints including one that temple land was grabbed. As someone laughingly told me, "They are cutting down all the trees to make a clearing in the forest." In other words, Amma, as promised during her feisty rally in Madurai in October last year, is "cleaning" up Madurai. From a person who was so powerful in Madurai that even brother Stalin had to get a visa to visit — that’s what Jayalalitha said — has become helpless as one after another of his aides is seeing the inside of a prison after being booked in a land grab case. It began with the arrest of "attack" Pandi, who was allegedly involved in the torching of Tamil newspaper Dinakaran four years ago in which three employees died. Other "henchmen" have been arrested including Pottu Suresh alias Suresh babu, G Thalapathi and S R Gopi.
Denials, Denials
Rajathi Ammal, Karunanidhi’s third wife, who is also the mother of Rajya Sabha MP Kanimozhi (currently in Tihar jail after being named as an accused by the CBI in the 2G scam) has said in a DMK press release: "No such person named Ramesh had worked for me as an aide at any point of time and I have no connection with these reports." What has not been denied is that Ramesh allegedly pulled down houses in Trichy in which 31 Dalit families were residing for 20 years on Pongal day in 2008 and took over their land. The petition by the Dalits given to the district revenue officer (DRO) said that the aggrieved families lived in Rajiv Gandhi Nagar in E Pudhur. The petition also names Ramesh as an accountant of Rajathi Ammal.
Incidentally this is the second denial Rajathi Ammal has issued. Earlier this year, the then opposition leader Jayalalitha had claimed that Saravanan, a "sweeper" in Royal Enterprises (a furniture showroom in Chennai owned by Rajathi) and later Rajathi’s manager, was involved in the sale of Voltas land on Anna Salai to a Malaysian. Both Rajathi and Kanimozhi had issued statements that Saravanan was a former employee.
Again IAS officer C Umashankar, had in a petition last July to the centre, had said, "While I was working in ELCOT, twice I was called by Rajathi Ammal, wife of Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu, to her office at Alwarpet. I should have refused to meet her. However, by way of courtesy I met her in her office. She attempted to influence me to award contract to her men in the matter of purchase of 45000 fishermen wireless sets. I told her that only through e-tender contracts are finalised and I should not be disturbed."
More Plots
Parithi Ilamvazuthi, former information minister, has been named along with his assistant, Kakari, and other DMK men in a land grab case by Ranga Reddy, trustee of the Dharma Thoppu Trust. Reddy claims that they usurped his seven-acre plot in Villivakkam, Chennai (value Rs 200 crore). Interestingly, the DMK chief has also been named in the complaint to Chennai Police Commissioner J K Tripathy, which says "the deal would not have happened without the knowledge of Karunanidhi". Even more interestingly, Karunanidhi’s grandson, Udayanidhi Stalin (son of former deputy CM, M K Stalin) has been named as the "benami" of Doshi Builders (owned by Sarshad V Doshi) to whom the land was sold by Illamvazhuthi and Kakari after they allegedly forged documents to indicate they had acquired the property on July 10, 2010.
No Laughing Matter
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In the run-up to the elections, comedian Vadivelu collected hordes wherever he went campaigning in the state and got several laughs for his below the belt comments on Vijayakant, DMDK chief and opposition leader. He had wrung a lot of sympathy earlier when reports emerged that someone he trusted had duped him of land because he was illiterate. But the boot is on the other foot now. S Paslaniappan, a retired assistant general manager of a nationalized bank, who met the suburban police commissioner with a complaint, says the comedian had usurped his property worth Rs two crore. According to him, he bought 34 cents land at Irumbuliyur in his son’s name at an auction, held by the Tamil Nadu Industrial Investment Corporation (TIIC), for Rs 20 lakh and registered it in 2006. The auction was held after TLIC re-possessed the land when the previous owner , Ramachandran, who had pledged the land to help a friend in 1993, found the latter could not repay the loan. Three years after he bought the land, Palaniappan found a compound wall had been constructed around his land and he was told to back off because of clout with the government. The banker’s complaint says, "Ramachandran’s son had given the power of attorney to Vadivelu’s close friend, who had in turn given it to the comedian. Vadivelu then gifted it to his wife. "But that is a forged document as I’m the rightful owner," his complaint said.
The CM of Salem
Veerapandi was so powerful that one of his supporters is believed to have said, "If Azhagiri can be the prime minister of Madurai, Arumugam has every right to be the CM of Salem." One of the cases against him is for property of 85,000 sq. ft that he has been accused of usurping. In the second case, he is accused of evicting 23 families from the Angammal colony near Salem. In the third case — he is accused by N Balamohanraj, the district president of the VHP, of paying just Rs 40 lakh and grabbing land of 20,416 square feet which is actually worth Rs 4 crore — he was arrested when he came to the Central Crime Branch police to register his presence to fulfil his bail order from the Madras High Court. Also named as accused in this case is his nephew, P Suresh (who happens to be a former MLA) and his assistant Kowshikabhoopathy, who happens to be the brother the Vice-Chacellor of Tamil Nadu Agricultural University. Veerapandi, who has been lodged in Coimbatore central prison, has already served three days in jail for the first two cases, after absconding for a few days. The fact that the "CM of Salem" has shifted his allegiance from Stalin to Azhagiri is undeniable now. Incidentally, like Azhagiri, he had dropped in on his nephew, Suresh, in jail after the latter was involved in the multiple murders of a family of six last year. Veerapandi was a minister then. Veerapandi’s clout can be seen from the VIP treatment he gets in prison and the fact that he gets salaamed by his arresting officers. Is it any wonder that 12 cops including a DCP were summarily transferred after reports that Veerapandi got "royal treatment"?
This Land...
The "Azhagiri of Trichy" aka K N Nehru, a former minister, has been accused by Dr K Kathirvel of Namakkal of grabbing the Kanchana hotel spread over 20,000 sq ft in 2007. According to Kathirvel’s police complaint, he was running the hotel from 2005 but that Nehru, his brother Ramajayam, Trichy mayor M Anbazhagan flaunted forged documents and threw him out of the hotel. Asked why he waited so long to proffer a complaint, Kathirvel says, "How could I get justice from the perpetrators of the crime?" The Nehru brothers have dodged arrest so far.
Not so honourable mentions
DMK’s MLA J Anbazhagan (the only other Chennai MLA apart from Stalin) has been arrested allegedly for grabbing land in Tirupur. Anbazhagan (along with Sun TV COO Hansraj Saxena) is accused of grabbing a private paper mill at Karumathampatti in Coimbatore. The complainant is Srinivasan, who is in the business of buying and selling sick mills. Srinivasan said that he bought Zion Paper Mills from one Kingsley for Rs 13 crore in 2008. He had then upgraded the mill but Kingsley wanted it back. He is accused of using Anbazhagan, Hansraj Saxena to threaten Srinivasan into signing blank papers, police said.
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After the flurry of withdrawals of complaints against Hansraj Saxena, COO, Sun Network, the Chennai police have transferred all the cases to the CB-CID for further investigation. This may have been done to nip the withdrawals in the bud. This week, film producers Hitesh Jhabak and TD Raja and animation studio proprietor Arul Murthy filed separate petitions in the Madras high court seeking to withdraw their complaints. Earlier, film distributors TS Selvaraj and Shanmugavelu had withdrawn the complaints of cheating they had filed against Saxena. Saxena’s counsel claimed police had "foisted" the cases. "Initially, the complainants didn’t understand and filed petitions. Later, they realized and withdrew their complaints."
"This is not fair. They come to us with a complaint and soon withdraw it," a police officer said. Meanwhile, producer Rasu Madhuravan, has claimed that he had not asked the police to register a case but it had been done anyway. But as political analyst Gnani said: "It is strange that the court is allowing the withdrawal. Their earlier complaint was not just about cheating that they can settle the issue. It was also about criminal intimidation and extortion."
