Sunday, May 5, 2019

Case on I-T sleuths over ‘lottery king’ staffer death

A Subburaj & B Sivakumar TNN

Coimbatore/Chennai:  5.5.2019

The Coimbatore rural police on Saturday registered a case against income tax officials for abetting to suicide of an employee of ‘lottery king’ Santiago Martin.

The deceased, T Palanisamy, 45, of Urumandampalayam, was working as a cashier at Future Gaming and Hotel Service Private Limited at GN Mills in Coimbatore. The firm belongs to Martin with whom Palanisamy was associated for more than 25 years.

Palanisamy was questioned by I-T officials after they started searches on Martin’s premises, numbering about 70, on April 30. Palanisamy was questioned first at his home and later at his office. As per a complaint filed by his son P Rohin Kumar, Palanisamy had left home for office at 7am on Friday.

Kin allege I-T officials physically tortured employee of Martin

Around10.30am, Rohin Kumar was informed that his father did not reach office. Their searches did not yield any result. Around 3pm, Rohin Kumar got a call from the Karamadai police saying Palanisamy’s body was found in a pond at Velliankadu.

Rohin Kumar’s complaint said his father was tortured by I-T sleuths and that was the reason for his suicide. Kumar said an I-T official had beaten Palanisamy at their residence.

Based on the complaint, the Karamadai police registered a case against unidentified I-T sleuths under Section 306 (abetment of suicide) of the Indian Penal Code.

“The complainant did not mention the I-T officials’ names. We will have to conduct further investigation for more details,” said a police officer.

A senior I-T official, however, claimed his colleagues had not physically tortured Palanisamy. He said CCTV camera footage of Palanisamy’s questioning was available to verify his claims. “We have a statement from Palanisamy to prove there was no torture,” said the official.

He said I-T officials had asked 15 questions to Palanisamy and his answers were corroborated with the statement given by his senior Kennedy. “When Palanisamy came to our office on the second day, he had blood stains on his hand. We asked him about the injury. His reply was that he had injured himself in a fall. All these are recorded,” said the official.

The official said nothing was found in Palanisamy’s residence but there were loose sheets at his office, which had details of accounts for three years.

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