CHENNAI: The Madras High Court has directed the State Bank of India (SBI) to narrate the circumstances under which the jewellery belonging to the Pudukottai Royal Family was deposited with it in 1948. The First Bench comprising Chief Justice MY Eqbal and Justice TS Sivagnanam gave the direction on Tuesday, while passing interim order on a public interest writ petition from Thanushkodi of Periyakulam, in Madurai district.The petition prayed for a direction to the SBI to produce all the records pertaining to the jewellery mentioned in a GO dated October 5, 1948 and deposited with it and to notify them under the Antiquity Jewels and Treasuries Act and Rules of Indian State (Abolition of Privileges) Act.According to petitioner, the Pudukottai Royal Family members had deposited the jewelleary in two boxes with the SBI in Tiruchy and Chennai from 1870 onwards and they were antique in nature. They represented the heritage and culture of the nation and as such they were of national importance.Petitioner alleged that one Rajkumari Rema Devi of Tiruchi, who had links with international criminial mafia gangs, had smuggled some of the jewellery out of the country. As such, there was a doubt whether the jewellary kept in the two boxes were originals or duplicate ones.Meanwhile, Rema Devi (72) of Kandankaranpatty in Pudukottai district, who claimed that she belonged to the Pudukottai Raja family, has filed a petition to implead herself as a party in the writ petition. She denied the allegations made by the petitioner. Though the writ petitioner had made a serious, baseless, scandalous and defamatory allegation against her, she had not been cited as a respondent party in the petition. Therefore, she should be given an opportunity to defend her case, she said.
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