V K Sasikala's counsel suspects foul play in panel move

Chennai: The counsel for Ms V. K. Sasikala, former aide of late chief minister J. Jayalalithaa, suspects foul play in the petition filed by standing counsel for the Justice Arumughasamy Commission seeking to implead health secretary J. Radhakrishnan in the proceedings relating to Jayalalithaa's death.

Counsel for the Commission, Mohammed Jafarullah Khan, had on December 27 filed a petition seeking to implead Radhakrishnan and former chief secretary Rao as respondents in the proceedings. Based on this, Minister for Law C. Ve. Shanmugam had a few days ago hit out at the health secretary, saying Jayalalithaa would have been saved if an angiogram had been done on her.

Speaking to journalists after appearing before the commission on Friday, Sasikala's counsel N. Rajasenthoor Pandian said the Commission's counsel filed the petition with an ulterior motive, to create confusion among people and divert attention from the current political scenario.

Pandian said Radhakrishnan had on Friday informed the Commission that the situation had not arisen for cardiologists to perform angio on Jayalalithaa. 

“If doctors from AIIMS had suggested angio, we would have considered doing it. 

But doctors from AIIMS had not advised such a procedure on her,” Pandian said. Radhakrishnan also said they hoped the chief minister would return home after getting cured.

Pandian said that on December 19, 2018, AIIMS physician Dr Devaguru had informed the Commission that angio was not required on Jaya as she did not face any heart-related issues. But, instead of posing related questions to Dr Devaguru, Khan posed these to Radhakrishnan on December 20. “This shows he had an ulterior motive in raking up the issue,” he said.

Pandian said that Radhakrishnan had informed the Commission that the need for submitting a medical report on Jayalalithaa's health to the government did not arise since everyone, including ministers, top officials and MP Thambidurai, remained at Apollo hospital during her hospitalisation and were being briefed daily by the hospital. Radhakrishnan also recalled a letter submitted by chief secretary Girija Vaidyanathan, dated October 29, 2018, pointing to this.

Earlier, Pandian had demanded that the commission summon ministers Dindigul C. Sreenivasan, D. Jayakumar and C. Ve. Shanmugam for making baseless allegations in connection with the 75-day-long treatment provided to Jayalalithaa.

Apollo hospital had filed a petition before the Commission seeking to constitute an expert medical board to assist the Commission. On Thursday, the hospital filed another petition stating that it will not participate in the proceedings until constitution of the medical board.