Date:13/08/2008 URL: http://www.thehindu.com/2008/08/13/stories/2008081351060400.htm

Tamil Nadu - Chennai

Writ petition filed to defame me: Raja

Special Correspondent

CHENNAI: Former Tamil Nadu Handlooms Minister N.K.K.P.Raja has said that a habeas corpus petition, in which he has been cited as a respondent, has been filed “with an intention to foster personal disputes at the instance of my political enemies and the rival political party.”

In his counter to the petition, Mr.Raja submitted that he was a law-abiding citizen and had been maintaining good reputation in the State. The entire story had been fabricated to tarnish his image “which I have earned in my political and social life for the past 25 years.”

The petitioner had filed the petition by raising various disputed questions of fact without any iota of material and that it could not be adjudicated in the writ jurisdiction. He was unaware of the land dispute alleged by the petitioner and the detenus till the date of publication of news items in the press. Nowhere in the petition had the petitioner given any specific instance of his (Raja’s) participation.

The matter related to a petition by one N.Elangovan of Sullampatty in Perundurai taluk in Erode district who sought a direction to the police to produce his father-in-law P.C.Palanisamy and mother-in-law P.Malarvizhi and brother-in-law P.Sivabalan, and set them at liberty. All the three were present in the court on a later date.

Mr.Raja said the writ petition had been filed only with an oblique motive to defame him in the general public because the petitioner and the detenus knew well that their allegations were bereft of any truth.

A Bench comprising Justices P.K.Mishra and K.Kannan adjourned the matter to August 20.