AIADMK symbol case: Court asks Delhi Police to medically examine Chandrashekhar
New Delhi: A special court on Tuesday directed the Delhi Police to ensure regular medical check-up of a man arrested for allegedly striking a deal of Rs 50 crore to help an AIADMK faction keep the 'two leaves' poll symbol.
Special Judge Poonam Chaudhry passed the direction after the counsel for accused Sukesh Chandrashekhar, an alleged middleman, filed an application alleging that the police was not allowing them to meet him and said he should be regularly medically examined in police custody.
The court asked the Delhi Police's Crime Branch to medically examine Chandrashekhar, who is in police custody till April 25, after every 48 hours and allowed his lawyers to meet him in custody.
Defence counsel Ashwini Kumar sought the copy of the FIR and, while narrating the manner in which Chandrashekhar was produced before a court yesterday, told the court that the police had kept the lawyers in the dark and misguided them to make sure that defence lawyers are not present when they produce the accused at the judge's residence.
The counsel said the police secured custody of the accused without their presence and took away his right to be defended.
Chandrashekhar, who was arrested from a five-star hotel in New Delhi on April 16, was remanded to eight days police custody.
The case pertains to an alleged attempt to bribe an Election Commission (EC) official by AIADMK (Amma) leader TTV Dinakaran for trying to get the party's poll symbol of 'two leaves' in a by-election to the R K Nagar Assembly seat in Tamil Nadu. The polling was later cancelled by the EC.
Chandrashekhar was arrested on April 16 after which an FIR was lodged. According to the police, his links with EC officials was being probed.
Chandrashekhar had struck a deal for Rs 50 crore to help the AIADMK faction to keep the 'two leaves' symbol, the police alleged, adding that Rs 1.3 crore and two luxury cars, a BMW and a Mercedes, were recovered from him.
The EC had frozen AIADMK's symbol after two factions led by Sasikala and former chief minister O Panneerselvam staked a claim to it.
The bypoll to the R K Nagar Assembly constituency was scheduled for April 12, but the EC cancelled it, saying the electoral process had been "seriously vitiated" by parties through use of money power. Dinakaran was the candidate of the Sasikala faction.
The bypoll was necessitated following the death of Chief Minister J Jayalalithaa on December 5 last year.
