Safe vault in Jayalalithaa's Kodanad estate untouched

CHENNAI: The target of robbers who struck at the palatial hill retreat bungalow belonging to late chief minister J Jayalalithaa in Kodanad in the scenic Nilgiris may have been the rumoured cartons full of cash and not any valuable documents.

What lends credence to this theory is that the vault inside the sprawling mansion was left untouched. Top police sources told Deccan Chronicle here on Friday that preliminary investigations have revealed that documents were not the target, punching holes in reports that the robbers could have barged into the mansion looking for a possible will that the departed leader might have left.  

“The gang was certainly looking for cash and not documents. As there was no cash, a fight broke out between them and it looks like Kanagaraj, who was late Jayalalithaa’s driver, had tricked these people into joining him by claiming that there will be a huge stash of cash inside the mansion. And when cash was not found, a quarrel broke out inside the mansion itself,” a senior police officer said.

The robbers disclosed the details after eight of them were arrested. One more person who is wanted in the case.

The main suspect Kanagaraj died in a road accident last Friday, while another suspect Sayan met with an accident on early Saturday morning in Palakkad, while he was driving to Thrissur from Coimbatore. While he is recuperating at a hospital, his wife and daughter were killed in the mishap. Police sources noted that the probe team is waiting for Sayan to recover completely to record his statement.

Sayan, who is working as a manager at a bakery in Coimbatore, and Kanagaraj had planned the heist with the former allegedly mobilising a gang from Kerala for the operation. Sayan had earlier worked as an assistant to timber dealer Sajeevan in Ooty, which is when he developed contact with Kanagaraj. Half of the intruders who are now under the custody of the Tamil Nadu Police, the investigators said, were not even aware of the fact that the bungalow belonged to Jayalalithaa. “We believe they were told that the bungalow belonged to an MLA.

Before they killed the guard and entered the bungalow on the night of April 23, the gang, during the day, had checked the gates to make sure there were no CCTV cameras installed in the premises. “The gang members were not ready to believe Kanagaraj’s version that there are no CCTV cameras. They wanted to make sure and also wanted to check the numbers of guards,” sources said. As of now, police believe that the gang had taken only some wrist watches and crystal artefacts from the estate bungalow.