COIMBATORE: The Coimbatore Crime Branch police on Saturday arrested former AIADMK member B Aathma Sivakumar (53) for allegedly cheating over 60 government job aspirants to the tune of Rs 2.17 crore. His associate Manikandan, sister Sathyabama and her husband Jaikrishnan were also booked and a hunt is on to nab them.
According to the police, the complainant M Marisamy (34) from Ponmedu near Punjai Puliyampatti in Erode district said he was introduced to Sivakumar by his relative Subramaniam when he was looking for a government job in 2015, adding Sivakumar allegedly told him that he had close contacts with the then
AIADMK ministers Ponnaiyan, SP Velumani and RB Udhayakumar.
Sivakumar allegedly asked Marisamy to apply for the post of Village Administration Officer in 2016 and allegedly demanded Rs 10 lakh to get him through the TNPSC exam. Mariasamy claims he paid Rs 8.2 lakh in instalments to his close associates, Manikandan, Sathyabama, Jaikrishnan, Sivakumar and Venkatasamy, but later realised he had been cheated. He filed a police complaint in 2021.
The police said so far 68 people from Coimbatore, Tiruppur and Nilgiris districts have filed complaints against Sivakumar and his associates. Subramaniam, who introduced Marisamy to Sivakumar, also lodged a cheating complaint against Sivakumar in Nilgiris on Saturday.
“He has also been booked in similar cases in Thoothukudi, Dharmapuri, Erode and Nilgiris districts in the past few years, following which he was absconding for a year,” said Inspector of district Crime Branch I Rajeshwari. A probe is on.