Stage set for legal battle in TANSI cases from today

By J. Venkatesan

NEW DELHI, SEPT. 30. With the Madras High Court taking up hearing of all the 18 appeals in the TANSI and other cases afresh from Monday, Mr. K.K. Venugopal, senior counsel for the former Chief Minister, Ms. Jayalalithaa, today left for Chennai to argue the case for her from the beginning and the stage is set for legal battle again.

Mr. N. Jothi, counsel for Ms. Jayalalithaa in Chennai, who was in Delhi since Friday held extensive discussions with Mr. Venugopal and another counsel, Mr. K.V. Viswanathan, on the strategy to be adopted during arguments in the changed circumstances following the Supreme Court quashing her appointment as Chief Minister.

According to present indications, Mr. Venugopal might take at least two-and-half days, i.e. till forenoon of Thursday (Tuesday being a holiday for the court on account of Gandhi Jayanthi) to complete his arguments in the three appeals filed by Ms. Jayalalithaa, two in TANSI cases (M/s Jaya Publications and M/s Sasi Enterprises) and one in the Pleasant Stay Hotel case.

Thereafter Mr. Vinod Arvind Bobde, senior advocate from Delhi, will complete his arguments on behalf of Ms. Sasikala, followed by counsel for the other appellants.

Indications are that Mr. K.V. Venkatapathi, special prosecutor in all the appeals, will take at least two to three weeks to give his reply to the submissions made by counsel for the appellants. It is likely that the legal battle will spill over to the first week of November.

The outcome of these appeals is very crucial to Ms. Jayalalithaa as she would be able to contest the elections only if she is acquitted or the sentence is reduced.

It may be recalled that in one of the two TANSI cases, the trial court awarded Ms. Jayalalithaa three years imprisonment and in the other two years imprisonment. As a result, she could not contest the general elections in May though she filed nominations from four constituencies. And in the `Pleasant Stay Hotel case', she was sentenced to undergo imprisonment for one year.

After arguments began in the appeals on August 27 before Mr. Justice R. Balasubramaniam, Mr. Venkatapathi filed a petition in the Supreme Court on August 31, seeking transfer of the appeals to another High Court and the apex court stayed the proceedings pending in the High Court. Thereafter on September 7, the apex court disposed of the transfer petition by directing that the appeals should be heard afresh from October 1 by another Judge.

Accordingly, the High Court has nominated Mr. Justice N. Dinakar to hear the appeals and in the meanwhile the High Court Registry has handed over about 10,000 pages of documents connected with the appeals to Mr. Venkatapathi.

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