Puducherry: The hearing in the Sankararaman
murder case in which Kanchi Seer Jayendra Saraswathi and his
junior Viajayendra Saraswathi are prime accused, will resume
in a local court on October 21.
Special Public Prosecutor N Devaodss said the eight week
interim stay granted by Madras High court on a petition by
Chennai based advocate P Sundararajan would end on October 20.
The Madras High court had granted the stay on August 25 on
the petition, which alleged that there was an attempt to
influence the trial court verdict and that tapes of telephonic
conversation that had surfaced recently indicated the alleged
attempt to influence the trial court judge.
Sankarararaman, manager in Varadharajaperumal temple in
Kancheepuram was allegedly murdered at his office on the
temple premises on September 3, 2004. The two seers have been
charged under sections 120-B (criminal conspiracy) and 302
(murder) in the case.
As per the original schedule, the Principal District and
Sessions Judge T Ramasamy had posted commencement of arguments
in the case to on Monday. He had earlier completed viewing of
video cassettes relating to investigation into the case and
also had listened to audio cassette on August 12 and had
posted the arguments in the case to commence today.
A total of 189 prosecution witnesses were examined and cross
examined since commencement of the trial here in April 2009,
of whom 81 had turned hostile.
The trial was shifted to Puducherry on a petition Jayendra
Saraswathi had filed in the Supreme Court in October 2005.
PTI
First Published: Monday, September 05, 2011, 17:50