Court stops Sasikala Pushpa's marriage

Madurai/Chennai/Delhi: A Family Court at Madurai has stayed the marriage of AIADMK Rajya Sabha member Sasikala Pushpa to Dr B. Ramaswamy, set to take place at a star hotel in Delhi, as the groom is already married and his marriage is still legally valid. The controversial MP and Ramaswamy were to get married at ‘The Lalit’ in Delhi’s Connaught Place on Monday.

Passing the order on a petition filed by Sathyapriya, 34, who alleged that she had married Ramaswamy three years ago and their marriage was still legally intact, Judge N.Venkadavaradhan said on Friday that after “careful consideration” of all the circumstances and evidence placed before the court, the petitioner has “prima facie established the subsistence of a valid marriage”. If at all Ramaswamy wants another marriage, he must obtain “valid relief”—legal divorce—from a court of law, said the judge while staying his “contract of marriage” with any other lady till the disposal of the main petition.

“The court has done justice to me even as I am going through this hellish nightmare, which no other woman must suffer. Now my husband cannot marry her (Sasikala Pushpa) and if he does, it would amount to contempt of court”, Sathyapriya told reporters after the court verdict on Friday, fighting back tears. “She too is a woman, I am sure she will understand my situation and behave”, she added, expressing hope that Sasikala Pushpa would drop the marriage plan so that Ramaswamy would return to his wife and little daughter.

Sathyapriya had given a petition to the Madurai district collector on Tuesday, seeking his intervention to get back her husband or else grant her permission “for the mercy killing of myself and my child”. She told reporters that the collector promised help but it turned out the bureaucrat’s hands were tied as the controversy involved a tough woman MP, 'famous' for wrong reasons.

Sathyapriya said her marriage to Ramaswamy took place on December 10, 2014. Her family had wanted to marry her to a once-married man because of some flaw in her horoscope. A marriage broker introduced Ramaswamy. After the marriage, she went to live with husband in Delhi, where he took good care of her-except that his parents never visited them and she never got to see them, even during the hurried-up marriage. After she became pregnant, he sent her to her parent's house in Madurai for delivery promising to take her back as soon as the baby’s vazhagappu (baby shower). But he did not turn up after she delivered a girl, saying he had wanted a boy.

Soon he started building up pressure on her to get her to sign divorce papers, even sending goondas to her parents' house. They first offered money for the divorce and when she refused, abducted her brother to step up pressure. And then came the bombshell of the 'wedding invitation' over the social media. When she contacted him for confirmation, he evaded her. She filed a complaint at the All-Women's Police Station at Thiruparamgundram. Her husband came after several summons and allegedly bluffed to the cops saying he was a Supreme Court judge. He would not meet her.

“When I insisted on a reply from him, a yes or no regarding this wedding news, he first denied it and later sent me the invitation. Imagine how I would have felt getting invitation from my husband for his own wedding”, said Sathyapriya.
It remains to be seen if Judge Venkadavaradhan’s order will now stop Ramaswamy's marriage to the high-profile MP. She has been making headlines and set the social media afire more than once, ever since her pictures with DMK MP Tiruchy Siva came out mid-2016. And then was the explosive episode of her slapping Siva at the Delhi airport in July that year; she later claimed she got angry because he was speaking ill of her leader Jayalalithaa.