No AC, mattress for Sasikala in prison: DIG

CHENNAI: AIADMK General Secretary V K Sasikala does not enjoy a separate bathroom or facilities like water heater, air-conditioner, cot and mattress in her cell at the central jail in Bengaluru, prison authorities have said. Replying to an RTI query by a Chennai-based lawyer, the DIG (Prisons), Central Prison at Parappana Agrahara, said except for a television set, other facilities were not allowed to her. Sasikala is serving a jail term in the Bengaluru prison in the disproportionate assets case in which she and two of her relatives were convicted by the Supreme Court. Replying to the February 20 RTI application from M P Rajavelayutham, the DIG confirmed that she was allowed to meet her nephew and AIADMK Deputy General Secretary T T V Dinakaran for 35 to 40 minutes. Dinakaran had met Sasikala in the prison on February 20 for the first time after her loyalist E K Palaniswami won the vote of confidence in the Tamil Nadu Assembly two days earlier. To another query on whether any recommendation was made to the Karnataka government to transfer Sasikala and her relative Elavarasi, also convicted in the case, to the Central Prison in Chennai, the authority replied "No such application received from the said convict prisoners." The prison authority's reply come amid reports in a section of media that Sasikala had been provided facilities such as a mattress and a separate bathroom. Sasikala, Elavarasi and V N Sudhakaran, another convict in the case, were lodged in the prison on February 15 after they surrendered before the trial court following the Supreme Court order upholding their conviction and four-year imprisonment.