A special court trying corruption cases yesterday directed former Chief Minister, Jayalalitha and four others including her close friend, Sasikala Natarajan, to be present in the court on September 17 for framing charges in the Tamil Nadu Small Industries (TANSI) land deal case.
Jayalalitha and Sasikala were absent when the case was taken up by P Anbazhagan, Judge III of the special court, who allowed petitions filed on their behalf for condoning their absence for the days hearing.
Three other accused in the case - former minister, Mohammed Asif, former tansi managing director, T R Srinivasan and former special deputy collector (stamps), S Nagarajan were present at the court.
The TANSI case pertains to the alleged abuse of power, evasion of stamp duty and registration charges and under valuation in the purchase of land belonging to the state owned corpor ation by Jaya publication, a firm in which both Jayalalitha and Sasikala are partners.