She neither visits her constituency nor had ever spoken about its problems in the State Assembly. The fact that Jayalalitha is absolutely unaware of the happenings in her Andipatti constituency in Theni district got revealed recently, thanks to a thoughtless statement issued by her. Unable to digest the huge turnout of local people and the tumultuous reception given to DMK South Zone Organising Secretary and Union Minister for Fertilisers Thiru M.K.Alagiri on his visit to Kadamalaikundu in Andipatti constituency, she issued this statement published prominently in a pro-Jaya English daily under the heading, “Was Horlicks hijacked? Jayalalitha seeks CBI inquiry into the disappearance of food supplement.” In the statement Jayalalitha had demanded a CBI inquiry into the pilferage of 9,240 bottles of Horlicks from a godown at a village near Sholavandan recently as there was a suspicion that the stolen bottles were the ones distributed free of cost at a function near Kadamalaikundu by Thiru Alagiri on July 18. She had said the inquiry was needed as the ‘public’ had the suspicion that the 8,700 Horlicks bottles distributed at a health camp organized in connection with Kalaignar’s birth day celebrations were the ones that went missing on July 12. She went on saying that there was a ‘widespread suspicion’ among the ‘public’ whether the Horlicks bottle were stolen at the behest of Alagiri.
What really happened at the said free health camp organized jointly by Madurai Arvind Eye Hospital and Apollo Hospitals? In that function 8,700 persons were given free treatment and also supplied with nutrition tonics and tablets, Horlicks packets and vegetarian meals; moreover 87 poor students were also given free laptop computers, to mark the 87th birthday of Kalaignar. In a statement issued by Theni district DMK Secretary Thiru L.Mookaiah on July 16 and published in ‘Murasoli’ on July 17, Party functionaries were asked to bring poor and downtrodden, who could not so far avail of specialized treatment, to the camp by arranging vehicles to transport them. The articles to be distributed free of cost at the function were also mentioned in that statement. The public of the area and district were very well aware of all these arrangements and the things distributed there. It was only 200gm Horlicks packets distributed at the function and not 500gm ‘bottles’ allegedly missing and distributed; the local people were very well aware of all these facts. So, none of them would have informed Jayalalitha. It could only be the suspicion of her statement writer duly endorsed and owned by her. Thiru Mookaiah has challenged her to prove her allegation offering to quit politics.
Thiru M.K.Alagiri himself has refuted her allegations and said, “I have strong proof against Jayalalitha’s allegation that Horlicks bottle were stolen at my behest for disbursal during the health camp… Contrary to the truth, she claimed that 500gm bottles were disbursed, when only 200gm packets were distributed. The Horlicks packets were bought by us from one Balakrishnan, a trader in Theni” he said, challenging, “is Jayalalitha ready to meet me in the public?” In her statement Jayalalitha had alleged that the bottles were stolen from the godown in Sholavandan owned by a businessman from Namakkal.
The English daily published her statement in 4 columns and the refutals of Thiru Alagiri and Thiru Mookaiah were published as a single column news in obscure corners. Late Ramnath Goenka will turn on his grave for this ‘patrika dharma’ or journalistic ethics!
That Jayalalitha has no moral compunction, to tender apology for making any baseless and untrue allegation she makes or face the challenges of the offended and face consequences, is well known. But people will wonder when she developed respect for the CBI, that too to inquire into a private affair? Because, it was Jayalalitha, who as Chief Minister said in the Assembly that the sleuths of the premier Central Investigation Agency, CBI after all did not descend from the heavens, when members of the opposition demanded a CBI inquiry for a scandal in the government.
The recalcitrant attitude of Jayalalitha when challenged by her opponents to either prove her baseless allegations against them or tender unconditional apology was observed by people many a times.
Recently addressing a meeting at Coimbatore she made several concocted charges against Chief Minister Kalaignar; but she always adds up clauses to her charges, like ‘according to information received’ ‘so speak the people’ etc., in order to disown personal commitment and escape defamatory cases. Very much against how a section of the media project her of being very courageous, she, in fact, is a coward to the core. One of the silly charges she made at the Coimbatore meeting was that ‘the Kalaignar Health Insurance Scheme was introduced only for the benefit of the family members of Kalaignar. The government had paid a premium of Rs.2,000 crore to get a commission of Rs.400 crore’ she said and wanted to know ‘who pocketed the agent commission?’ Kalaignar retorted and dared her to prove her charge saying, “It is highly unbecoming of former CM to level such meaningless charge’ as the government had allotted just Rs.750 crore for the scheme.’ The premium of Rs.569.54 crore and service tax of Rs.38.66 totalling Rs.628.20 crore only had been paid to the company of which the company had paid upto July 14, Rs.394.72 crore as insurance amount.’ The person who failed to file her Income Tax return for the year 1994-95 and faced prosecution had demanded IT searches in the houses of Kalaignar’s relatives ‘to unearth this concealed income of Rs.400 crore.’ Assuming that she was giving a ‘fitting rejoinder’ to Kalaignar’s clarification on premium amount, she further entangled herself in contradiction that she quoted the amount of Rs.2,000 crore by calculating for 4 years at the rate of Rs.500 crore per annum. Even taking her statements for face value which private company will give ‘agent commission’ before the premium was paid for calculating the ‘commission of Rs.400 crore?’ Or is it her tacit admission that the DMK will return to power in 2011 and continue with the scheme?
Similarly, she made false allegations in the detection of spurious and expired drugs and after the Chief Minister’s clarification and challenge to state the number of drug inspectors during her rule and whether the numbers were reduced by this government, she didn’t reply. Thiru M.K.Stalin’s son-in-law slapped a legal notice on her for her allegation against him. Every time Kalaignar refuted her allegations and bounces back she closes her mouth on the subject and switches over to some other.
Like her sudden found esteem for the CBI, Jayalalitha has preached sermons on the eminence and honour of the judiciary and courts. The DMK Youth Wing announced staging of state-wide demonstrations against Jayalalitha, condemning the repeated adjournments on flimsy grounds and dragging out the Disproportional Wealth Case for more than 13 years, thus insulting the judiciary as well as the people of Tamil Nadu. Taking exception to it, Jayalalitha said the agitation was laughable and amounted to ‘threatening’ the court (in Karnataka). Jayalalitha had been pulled up and censured by different courts for dragging out cases against her on flimsy grounds. On 24.2.2006, when she was the CM, Supreme Court judges Justice P.N.Agarwal and Justice A.K.Mathur censured her saying, “You are making mockery of the judicial process. How long can you drag out the proceedings?” in the Income Tax Return case. On 18.11.2003, Supreme Court judges S.N.Variava and H.K.Sema gave the ruling in the Rs.66.64 crore disproportionate assets case transferring the trial to a court in Karnataka in order to “establish the sanctity of the judicial process and the confidence people have reposed on it” because she was dragging it out for 6 years till then (13 years now).
Even last week on August 2, the CBI Special Court judge Justice Ravindran, hearing the Birthday Gift case against Jayalalitha, chided her counsel for seeking yet another adjournment after being given several of them for the final hearing and posted the case on August 10, strictly telling, ‘This is the final adjournment. Hereafter it won’t be entertained.”
Now the reason advanced by her in the Disproportionate Assets case, which is in the final stages of trial, is that the English translations of the depositions of witnesses, given to her in the year 2005, were not correct. When the Special Court hearing the case dismissed her plea, she had filed appeal in the Karnataka High Court. If the translations were inaccurate what was she doing all these five years. On the face of it, the plea is to protract the trial and the delivery of final judgement that she fears will be disastrous to her public life.
The people of Tamil Nadu will not forget Jayalalitha’s track record of insulting and intimidating the judiciary. Whenever she was in power, she was vindictive towards judges and their relatives disconnecting drinking water supply to the residence of Justice Srinivasan, arresting the son-in-law of Justice A.R.Lakshmanan by fabricating a narcotic (ganja) case against him, ADMK wormen’s wing members obscene demonstration against Subramanyan Swamy in the High Court premises, protest agitations against the judgement in Pleasant Stay Hotel resulting in the burning of three college girls in a bus, her statement in the Assembly that judges were also human beings prone to committing mistakes but they had the protection under contempt of court provision, etc.,
With such an awful record in her baggage, Jayalalitha has the temerity to feign innocence and claim that the cases filed against her are politically vindictive and that she will establish justice in the courts of law.
If Jayalalitha thinks that she can speak anything and issue statements whimsically she is badly mistaken. In her Coimbatore meeting she made a distateful remark which even fourth rate platform speakers of her party will not dare to suggest. A woman, who boasted of her intimate relationship with husbands of other women (with one of whom, she said she thought of committing ‘sati’ when he died and with another one, she claimed that her relationship was ‘going steady’), has no moral standing to speak about other cultured women.
Kalaignar has recently given her a final warning not to speak whatever she wanted. Even after facing drubbing in three successive general elections, if Jayalalitha fails to mend her ways, to borrow Superstar Rajnikanth’s words, even god will not be able to save her!
(08-08-10)
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