After seven long years, former chief minister Jayalalithaa’s aide V.K. Sasikala visited the Kodanad estate in Nilgiris on Thursday. She will be in the estate bungalow for a couple of days. This is her first visit to the estate since the death of Jayalalithaa and after she returned from the Bengaluru prison. Though the estate is still with Sasikala’s family, she had not visited it after the heist-cum-murder in 2017.
Sources say that Sasikala’s visit is to perform a bhoomi pooja for setting up a statue of Jayalalithaa inside the estate premises. The statue is likely to be unveiled by Sasikala on Jayalalithaa’s birthday on February 24. Kodanad was a Jayalalithaa’s favourite holiday home and at times her camp office. Many of the political decisions were taken by Jayalalithaa when she was in Kodanad.
Sasikala’s visit to the estate assumes significance at a time when the Special Investigation Team under the CB-CID is investigating the murder case. A team of cyber forensic experts from Gujarat is likely to visit the Trichy BSNL office soon to examine the Call Record Details (CDR) of the mobile phones used by the accused involved in the Kodanad heist case. The SIT had earier submitted in the court in Nilgiris that the CDR associated with 19 mobile towers had been recovered and sent for forensic analysis. Details of vital data and images deleted from the phones used by the accused and others have been compiled into an 8,000 page report and sent for forensic analysis, according to sources.
Incidentally, the SIT had also questioned two security officers of former chief minister Edappadi Palaniswamy. It is yet to be seen if the CDR has details of Palaniswamy’s security officers. Data in at least eight mobile phones and five SIM cards used by the accused including A1 Kanagaraj have been seized by the SIT and sent for forensic analysis. Apart from this, CDRs of over 30 mobile numbers, obtained in a magnetic tape format, have also been sent to the national forensic unit for examination.
While there have been many unanswered questions linked to the heist and the murder, according to sources, the police are also investigating if there are any links to the heist and the Income Tax raids in Jayalalithaa’s Poes Garden residence and the tax raids against Sasikala when she was in the Bengaluru prison.
However, the investigation in the Kodanad heist-cum-murder case has not moved forward even when the DMK government led by Chief Minister M.K. Stalin promised to punish the culprits. Apparently, in April 2022, the special investigation team which was investigating the case had questioned Sasikala at her residence in T Nagar.
But Sasikala has never opened up on what was stolen from Kodanad bungalow. Only very recently the CBCID, according to sources in the estate, had seized a few door handles and window panes which were damaged during the heist. Also the crime scene which remained the same since the heist is said to have been cleared and a few repair work has been done. However, it remains to be seen if she will talk about the heist after her visit.
