‘Aadu’ no ordinary mortal; hoarded huge wealth

KOLLAM: Aadu Antony had amassed  wealth to the tune of over a crore of rupees,   including  land and electronic gadgets, since 2012 when he killed a police driver in Kollam and escaped.

The documents of about five cents of land worth Rs. 10 lakh at Dharapuram in Tirupur, electronic gadgets, including laptops and mobile phones, were recovered from his house at Gopalpuram.  He had also constructed a house  worth about Rs. 10 lakh at Dharapuram.

Antony, who was brought to Kollam in the  wee hours of Wednesday from Palakkad,  was learnt to have confessed to the murder of police driver Maniyan Pillai. He was produced before a local court at Paravur and remanded in  police custody for 12 days.   The police are also planning to conduct a DNA test on him to confirm his identity.

“The probe is  in the initial stages. We will  interrogate  him in detail in the coming days to get sufficient evidence to charge him in the murder and  other cases,”  Kollam city police commissioner P. Prakash said.

During quizzing by a  team led by Mr. Prakash, Antony confessed to  the murder and his  involvement  in several robberies in Tamil Nadu, many of which were near educational institutions at Erode, Salem, Palani and Coimbatore. He had also stolen nearly Rs. 10 lakh in cash from several places in Tamil Nadu.

Antony used the name Selvaraj and also faked an identity card with Kannur business. The stolen articles were recovered from his house at Dharapuram and the house of his present wife Bindhu at Gopalapuram.

Bank passbooks with lakhs of deposits, LIC policy, driving licence and other government identity cards were also recovered. During the three-year hideout, Antony spent many months in  Mumbai, Pune, Nepal and  Jaipur.

A large number of people thronged the  Kollam district police chief's office to see the notorious criminal.