Today, in a case against Tamil Nadu Chief Minister J Jayalalithaa against disproportionate assets worth Rs 66 crores, apex court refused to stay trial in lower court.
A bench of justices Vikramajit Sen and SK Singh also dismissed Jayalalithaa’s petition for staying her trial till the lower court decides the plea of a company alleging that some of the properties, shown as part of the disproportionate assets of the Tamil Nadu CM, actually are possed by them.
In 1996 DMK government after coming to power had filed the case after Jayalalithaa’s exit as the state’s chief minister. The assets case was transferred to Bangalore in 2003 following a Supreme Court directive on a petition alleging that a fair trial was not possible in Chennai during her tenure as chief minister then. Charges of accumulation of over Rs 66 crore worth of assets disproportionate to her known sources of income.
Besides Jayalalithaa, VK Sasikala, VN Sudhakaran and J Illavarasi have been named in the case.
CM had sought a stay on the trial till the lower court decides the plea of Lex Property Development (P) Ltd, a Chennai-based firm. Company claimed that the properties, which have been attached by the authorities as ‘benami‘ holdings of Jayalalithaa, in fact, belonged to it and said this plea be decided first before the lower court proceeds with the trial in the assets case.
