The Supreme Court today
permitted Sasikala Natrajan, a close aide of Tamil Nadu Chief
Minister J Jayalalithaa, to inspect certain documents filed by
the probe agency in the disproportionate assets case pending
against them before a Bangalore trial court.A bench of justices P Sathasivam and Ranjan Gogoi
while allowing Sasikala's plea said that the same shall be
completed within 21 days and the special court trying the
offence would determine the venue.The Apex Court, however, clarified that today's order
would not affect, in any manner, any part of the ongoing trial
or examination of the witnesses that has taken place so far.The court had on September 5 reserved its order after
hearing arguments by Sasikala's counsel on her appeal against
the Karnataka High Court ruling, which had concurred with the
trial court order that she was not entitled to the documents
which were not part of the charge sheet.Earlier on June 25, the apex court had refused to stay
the trial but had allowed her to place on record the relevant
material relating to her claim that she was not provided with
certain documents relating to the questions put to her in the
ongoing day-to-day trial.Jaya and others are accused of amassing
disproportionate wealth during her tenure as chief minister in
1991-96.On November 4 last year, the apex court had dismissed
Jayalalithaa's plea for exemption from personal appearance
before the trial court in Bangalore. The disproportionate assets (DA) case allegedly
involves accumulation of assets worth over Rs 66 crore by
Jayalalithaa between 1991 and 1996. The DA case proceedings were shifted out of Tamil Nadu
by the apex court in November 2003 following a petition filed
by DMK leader K Anbazhagan when AIADMK was in power. Jayalalithaa had said that the jewellery, silverware
and footwear were "over valued" by Tamil Nadu's Directorate of
Vigilance and Anti-Corruption and that she did not own all the
sarees confiscated in the case.
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