CHENNAI: A plea has been filed in a division bench of the Madras High Court to form a special investigation team (SIT) to probe tahsildar Samboornam’s intrusion into the counting centre in Madurai medical college where ballot boxes were stored.
A mention to this effect was made on behalf of S Venkatesan, CPM candidate for Madurai Lok Sabha constituency, before bench of Justices S Manikumar and Subramonium Prasad on Friday. The judges agreed to hear the matter on Saturday.
According to petitioner, Samboornam, despite strict vigil, trespassed into the documents storage room on April 20 without any authority and remained there for three hours. Shockingly, the police took note of the incident only after three hours and detained them.
Alleging that Dr Natarajan, Returning Officer of constituency, who is also Madurai Collector, is wholly responsible for the incident, petitioner contended that there was a total failure in the security system adopted by the authorities at the centre.
Petitioner’s interim prayer is to appoint a special observer in the rank of IAS officer for counting postal ballots and to provide three-tier security to the centre and the transfer the RO.