Police File Cases Against Expelled AIADMK Parliamentarian, Family

Madurai:  Acting on directions of Madras High Court bench, police today registered cases against expelled AIADMK Rajya Sabha member Sasikala Pushpa and two family members for submitting forged documents while filing anticipatory bail petitions in a case pertaining to ill-treatment and sexual abuse of two women domestic aides. Police said they had registered cases under IPC Sections 193 (Punishment for false evidence), 466 (forgery of record of court or of public register), 468 (forgery for purpose of cheating) and 471 (using as genuine a forged (document or electronic record). The cases were registered against Ms Pushpa, her husband R Lingeswara Thilagam and son Pradeep Raja. On September 14,the court had dismissed the anticipatory bail plea of Ms Pushpa and her three family members, including her mother, on a complaint by the MP’s two women domestic aides. They are facing charges under various IPC sections and also POCSO (Protection of Children from Sexual Offences) Act for allegedly sexually harassing the domestic women aides.

At a previous hearing, she had asked Ms Pushpa to explain how she had signed the ‘vakalatnama’ (power of attorney) by remaining in a foreign country, to which she had said that the signature was her own and that her husband came and collected it and gave it to her advocate. On August 26, the Supreme Court had granted protection from arrest to Ms Pushpa for six weeks in the case and said the High Court would expeditiously decide her anticipatory bail application, uninfluenced by its decision. Ms Pushpa was expelled from AIADMK after an alleged altercation with DMK MP Tiruchi Siva at the Delhi airport. Since then she has alleged that she was being threatened to resign from her post.]]>