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TANSI case judge comes under a cloud

N Sathiya Moorthy in Madras

With a pair of sunglasses and a hat, he looked like any other tourist visiting Malaysia. Only, he happened to be a judge of the Madras high court.

Justice S Thangaraj has landed in a soup now because of that trip. A photograph of his turned up in the possession of an estate agent in Madras who was arrested for brandishing a revolver at a client.

Justice Thangaraj was in the news recently for discharging former Tamil Nadu chief minister and All-India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam general secretary J Jayalalitha in the TANSI land deal case. The prosecution thought it had the case tightly shut, since it had relied mostly on documentary rather than oral evidence. The state government has since moved the Supreme Court against the order.

No one gave it any serious thought when newspapers reported that one Velluchami of Tirumangalam in Madras had made a police complaint against a real-estate agent, K V Krishnamurthy, of neighbouring Anna Nagar, for threatening him at gunpoint to return some property documents. But the police did not ignore the complaint and raided Krishnamurthy, mainly to recover the weapon and find out it was legal.

"What was in store was explosive," says an investigating officer. Krishnamurthy runs a video-parlour besides his real-estate agency. "When we raided the place looking for the gun, we came upon photographs of Justice Thangaraj in Malaysia. Krishnamurthy confirmed the identity of the person in the picture and also gave details of the tour." Next thing the photographs and details got into a Tamil newspaper closely identified with the ruling DMK.

According to Velluchami's complaint, he had lent Rs 1 million to Krishnamurthy against a house-mortgage. Later, he learnt that Krishnamurthy had sold the property to a man named Jayapal from Kuala Lumpur. It was when legal proceedings were on for Velluchami to bring the mortgaged property to public auction and recover his dues that Krishnamurthy threatened him at gunpoint.

Police investigations seem to have revealed more than what they are willing to say on record. According to reports, the controversial Jayapal played host to both Krishnamurthy and Justice Thangaraj in Malaysia from October 16. According to the statement reportedly made by Krishnamurthy to the police, he and the judge were in Malaysia as Jayapal's guests. Accompanying them were an advocate, Selvaraj, and a retired police superintendent, Selvaratnam.

The police have also reportedly recovered documentary evidence of Krishnamurthy having paid the rental for a marriage hall where the judge's son's wedding was celebrated on July 11 last year. Of this, Rs 10,000 was paid in cash and the remainder Rs 26,000 by cheque.

Investigators, however, say their curiosity was originally aroused not by the judge's photograph, but by several CDs and videotapes, which they suspected to contain pornographic material. They arrested Krishnamurthy and took him into custody for four days. But during his interrogation the judge's matter came to light.

According to Krishnamurthy's admission to the police, he was a daily wage earner at the Integral Coach Factory, Perambur, before hitting the big time in the real-estate business. Police say he defrauded many of his clients, including some senior police officers, both retired and serving.

They are also investigating his alleged links with a senior AIADMK politician from the southern districts who is known to be a stage-orator in his own right and is believed to have been the purpose behind the Malaysian Jayapal visiting Madras twice in 10 days, on January 1 and 10.

Earlier, former Union minister and Tamizhaga Rajiv Congress politician Vazhapadi K Ramamurthy had made allegations about the judge's 'Malaysian links' while commenting on the TANSI verdict. He had also mentioned the judge's foreign trip and his alleged links with an AIADMK politician.

Incidentally, the judge was elevated to the high court bench when Jayalalitha was chief minister of Tamil Nadu.

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