TN minister's brother granted bail

A local court today granted bail to O Raja, brother of Tamil Nadu Finance Minister O Panneerselvam, in a case booked against him under SC/ST (Prevention of Atrocities) Act, 1989.
Acting on the direction of the Madras High Court, Raja surrendered before Judicial Magistrate Sivagnanam at the Periyakulam court here and secured bail.
Earlier, Justice M M Sundresh of the court's Madurai Bench had on June 11 allowed a petition filed by Raja seeking a direction to the lower court to dispose of a bail application to be filed by him on the day of his surrender in the case.

The judge had granted the relief after the petitioner's counsel, R Gandhi submitted that there would be no necessity for Raja's custodial interrogation since the police had already completed the investigation and filed a charge sheet before Periyakulam Judicial Magistrate on June 4.
The judge had said the high court had granted anticipatory bail to the petitioner in the case in December 2012 when the police had booked Raja and other accused only under IPC section 306 (abetment of suicide) following the death of a Dalit priest S Nagamuthu in 2012. He had left behind a suicide note naming the people responsible for his death.

However, while filing the final report before the judicial jagistrate, they included Section 3(2)(5) of the SC/ST Act. Since it happened to be a non-bailable provision, Raja had approached the court expressing his willingness to surrender before the court and sought a direction to the lower court to consider granting him bail on the day of surrender.
Justice Sundresh had directed Raja to surrender within three weeks and serve copies of his bail application, in advance, on the prosecutor concerned as well as the complainant's counsel who had opposed his plea.
The father of the deceased had opposed it holding that bail could not be granted on the day of surrender without giving sufficient time to the prosecution to put forth its case.