EC bribery case: Delhi Police files chargesheet against middleman Sukesh
New Delhi: Delhi Police on Friday filed a chargesheet in a special court against an alleged middleman arrested in the Election Commission bribery case involving AIADMK (Amma) faction leader T T V Dhinakaran.
The police, however, did not name Dhinakaran in the final report and said that a supplementary chargesheet will be filed against him and other accused after it completes the probe against him.
The chargesheet was filed against Sukesh Chandrashekhar, who was arrested on April 16 and has been denied bail twice by the sessions court and then again by the Delhi High Court.
Special Judge Manoj Jain listed the matter before the concerned judge on July 17. A senior police official, associated with the case, said they had chargesheeted Chandrashekhar for various alleged offences under the IPC including forgery of valuable security, forgery for purpose of cheating, using forged document as genuine and possessing a forged document and intending to use it as genuine.
If convicted, the offences carry a maximum sentence of life imprisonment. Chandrashekhar was arrested for allegedly taking money from Dhinakaran to bribe Election Commission officials to get the AIADMK's ‘two leaves’ symbol for the Sasikala faction.
According to the Crime Branch of Delhi Police, they had seized a fake identity card of a Rajya Sabha Member of Parliament with security features from Chandrashekhar. It also allegedly recovered Rs 1.3 crore cash from him at the time of the raid at a hotel in Chanakyapuri in New Delhi.
Dhinakaran was arrested in New Delhi on the night of April 25 after four days of questioning for allegedly attempting to bribe Election Commission (EC) officials for the symbol. His close aide Mallikarjuna was also arrested on the same day. Dhinakaran, Mallikarjuna, suspected hawala operators Nathu Singh and Lalit Kumar are out on bail.
His faction had hoped to obtain the symbol for the bypoll to the R K Nagar Assembly seat in Tamil Nadu which was later cancelled by the EC after the alleged irregularities surfaced. The bypoll was necessitated by the death of Tamil Nadu Chief Minister J Jayalalithaa who represented the constituency.
The EC had frozen the AIADMK's symbol after the two factions of the party- one led by Dhinakaran's aunt Sasikala and the other by former chief minister O Panneerselvam- staked a claim to it.
Mallikarjuna was arrested for allegedly facilitating a Rs 50 crore deal between Dhinakaran and Chandrasekhar. Dhinakaran has been accused of arranging the money from undisclosed sources and getting it transferred from Chennai to Delhi through illegal channels.
