CHENNAI: In a lethal blow to Tamil Nadu Minister for Higher Education K Ponmudi and the ruling DMK, the Madras High Court on Thursday sentenced him to three years of imprisonment in a disproportionate assets case.
Justice G Jayachandran pronounced the sentence under the Prevention of Corruption Act, in the jam packed court hall number 46 of the Madras High Court. His wife P Visalakhsi is sentenced to undergo imprisonment of same quantum of three years. Both of them have also been fined Rs 50 lakhs each.
As per order of Justice G Jayachandran, Ponmudi gets 30 days to surrender before Trial Court to undergo sentence . In case, the couple fail to surrender on or before Jan.22, 2024, trial Court shall secure them by executing the warrant.
Appearing before the court, Ponmudy and his wife Visalakshi submitted their medical records and prayed for a minimum sentence citing their age and poor health. Since the sentence is for three years, he stands automatically disqualified as a member of the Tamil Nadu Legislative Assembly, to which, he was elected in 2021 polls.
The court verdict has deprived him of the eligibility to contest for elections for six years, leaving him in the sunset of his illustrious political career, and given his age, 72 years, a comeback appears to have remote chances.
The Minister is sentenced for the offence under section 13 (2) r/w 13 (1) (e) of PCA for amassing wealth to tune of Rs. 1.72 crore, which accounts for 64.90%, more than his known sources of income during his tenure as Minister for Higher Education, Mines and Minerals during 2006-11.
Ponmudi, an influential leader of DMK, started his career as a teaching faculty in a University, turned to politics later and became a close confidante of late party patriarch M Karunanidhi and his son and current Chief Minister MK Stalin.
He is the second top leader of a political party and a sitting Ministet in Tamil Nadu to be disqualified from the membership of the Legislative Assembly after late CM J Jayalalithaa who had to be stripped of the public position of CM and MLA after a special court in Bengaluru convicted and sentenced her in a wealth case.
A PhD holder, Ponmudi is known for his sharp political comments and remains a face of the party in the northern region of the State.
A 2011 FIR filed by the Directorate of Vigilance and Anti-Corruption (DVAC), after the AIADMK came back to power, over the disproportionate wealth, has now done him in. Ponmudi and his wife were acquitted by the special court for PCA cases in Villupuram on April 18, 2016.
Challenging this order, the DVAC filed an appeal in the High Court in 2017. After almost six years, the High Court convicted him on December 19 and announced that the sentence would be pronounced on December 21, 2023.
“The charge of offence punishable under section 13 (2) r/w 13 (1) (e) of PCA framed against A-1 (Ponmudi) stands proved. The charges under section 13 (2) r/w 13 (1) (e) of PCA and 109 IPC against A-2 (Visalakshi) stands proved,” Justice Jayachandran said in the conviction order.
He found that Rs. 1.72 crore worth assets were amassed by the couple disproportionate (64.90%) to known sources of income.
Trial court order is erroneous
“Considering the overwhelming evidence against the respondents, and the unsustainable reasons given by the trial court for acquittal by ignoring those evidence, compel this court to declare the judgment of the trial court is palpably wrong, manifestly erroneous and demonstrably unsustainable. Hence, this is a fit case for the appellate court to interfere and set it aside,” the judge ruled.
He assailed the trial judge saying that acceptance of the self-serving declaration of income to the Income Tax authority by an accused in a DA case, by ignoring the first principle of law and the judicial pronouncements, is not a possible view but “an erroneous view conceived due to misconception”.
He termed the trial court’s misinterpretation the bank account statements as proof of income, as a “complete miscarriage of justice” occurred by the “omission of reliable evidence” and by “misinterpretation of evidence”.
Further, he said the trial court’s ready acceptance of I-T returns of Ponmudi’s wife without any independent evidence is “palpably wrong and manifestly erroneous”.
“In the light of the above observations, the dictum and principles postulated by the Apex Court, applied to the case on hand, this court find that, the trial court on superficial reading of the evidence had proceeded with the process of decision making on the premise that A-1 and A-2 are separate entities and they both cannot be clubbed together. This is basically a fallacious approach by the trial court,” the judge said.
The DVAC’s September 26, 2011 FIR charged the couple of amassing wealth to the tune of Rs. 1.75 crore (65.90%) more than his known sources of income during the check period from April 4, 2006 to May 13, 2010. The trial court acquitted the couple in 2016. Challenging this order, the DVAC preferred the appeal in 2017.