Jailed TN minister V. Senthilbalaji's judicial remand extended till Aug 8

Principal Sessions Judge S.Alli extended the judicial remand after Senthilbalaji was produced from the Puzhal Prison via video conferencing.

The minister had undergone a bypass surgery at a city hospital on June 21, where he was shifted on the orders of the Madras High Court on June 15.

He was arrested in the early morning of June 14 by the ED after 17-hour-long raids at his official residence and at his chamber in the state secretariat and remanded in judicial custody till June 28.

While being taken in a car to the ED office for interrogation, the minister complained of chest pain and was rushed to Omandurar Government Multi super-speciality Hospital where an angiogram had revealed three blocks in his blood vessels and doctors advised a bypass surgery at the earliest.

After recovering from the surgery, he was discharged from the hospital and shifted to Puzhal prison.

Meanwhile, Tamil Nadu Governor R.N.Ravi, while allocating the portfolios held by Senthilbalaji to ministers Thangam Thennarasu and S.Muthusamy on the recommendations of Chief Minister M.K.Stalin, however, disagreed with his continuance in the state cabinet as he was facing criminal proceedings.

The Opposition parties in the state also demanded that he should be removed from the cabinet.

However, the Tamil Nadu government issued an order stating that he would continue to remain in the state cabinet as a minister without a portfolio.

Later, the Governor dismissed him from the cabinet under powers vested with him and subsequently kept it in abeyance on the advice of Union Home Minister Amit Shah who suggested that he seek the opinion of the Attorney General.

The minister's dismissal without his advice was disregarded by the Chief Minister who contended that the Governor has no powers to take such a decision and that it was his (CM's) prerogative to decide on who should remain in his cabinet or not.

Meanwhile, the Madras High Court delivered a split verdict in the Habeas Corpus petition filed by the minister's wife.

While Justice Banu observed that the petition was maintainable and that ED was not entitled to seek police custody, Justice Bharatha Chakravarthy ruled that Balaji's arrest did not amount to an illegal act by the ED, which could also take him into custody for interrogation.

Following this, it was referred to Justice CV Karthikeyan, the third judge appointed by the Chief Justice, who after hearing arguments from the petitioner and the ED concurred with the judgment of Justice Bharatha Chakravarthy and listed it before the Chief Justice to be heard by the Division Bench on deciding on the ED custody of the minister.

Yesterday, the case was listed before the same Bench, which had closed the HCP saying that the Supreme Court was seized of the matter.