The Madras High Court on Thursday issued a permanent injunction, restraining the brother of the main accused in the 2017 heist and murder at Kodanad estate, which had served as a retreat for former Tamil Nadu chief minister J Jayalalithaa until her death in 2016, from linking the state’s current Opposition Leader Edappadi K Palaniswami with the crime.
The main accused in heist-murder, late Kanagaraj, had worked as a driver for Jayalalithaa. It is his brother, S Dhanapal, who Palaniswami accused of making allegations against him in interviews. In a 2023 suit, Palaniswami argued that the allegations were politically motivated and damaging, and he sought Rs 1.1 crore in damages.
The Kodanad estate is a secluded, sprawling property in Nilgiris district. The heist-murder that took place there in April 2017, just months after Jayalalithaa’s death, had sparked widespread public speculation about the incident’s implications, with rumours and accusations swirling around high-profile political figures. Since then, the case has gripped the state and fuelled controversies around the AIADMK, which is led by Palaniswami.
Justice R M T Teekaa Raman, delivering the order, underscored the damage inflicted upon Palaniswami’s four-decade-long political career by what he described as “canards and false news”.
The order directed Dhanapal to pay the damages, and also said that no amount of money could truly compensate for the reputational harm suffered by Palaniswami. The order also said Palaniswami is “entitled to apply to all the print and electronic media and all the intermediaries to remove all the defamatory articles, publications and statements available against him, the subject matter of this Court”.
The order follows an interim injunction granted on September 26, 2023, by Justice R N Manjula, who had temporarily barred Dhanapal from further discussing his allegations against Palaniswami.
The civil suit filed by Palaniswami in 2023 charged Dhanapal with causing irreparable damage to his character by spreading what he described as false accusations. Palaniswami alleged that Dhanapal’s statements were not spontaneous, but part of a politically motivated agenda orchestrated by rivals aiming to discredit his leadership within the AIADMK and undermine his influence ahead of Lok Sabha elections.
The statements by Dhanpal that Palaniswami’s legal team referred to were from interviews that Dhanpal gave between August 24 and September 1, 2023.
According to the police chargesheet, the Kodanad heist-murder took place in the early hours of April 4, 2017, when an armed gang of 11 people, allegedly led by Kanagaraj, entered the estate with the aim of robbing the property.
Investigators alleged that the gang attacked and sedated a security guard, Krishna Thapa, and tied him up in a lorry. While two men guarded Thapa, the rest went to another gate and attacked and killed Om Bahadur, another security guard, police alleged.
Following the incident, Kanagaraj, the first accused in the case, was identified and lookout notices were issued. He was from Edappadi – the hometown of the then CM Palaniswami. Five days after the incident, Kanagaraj was killed in a road accident on the Salem-Chennai Highway.
Another accused, Sayan from Kerala’s Thrissur district, also got into an accident. His car reportedly rammed into a parked lorry, and while he survived, his wife and daughter did not.
A 29-year-old computer operator who worked at the estate, Dinesh Kumar, was found dead at his home in Kotagiri in July that year. Police ruled it a suicide.
In January 2019, Sayan organised a press conference in Delhi and alleged that Kanagaraj had told him the heist was being conducted at the behest of Palaniswami. He alleged that the instruction was to loot cash bundles and land documents worth crores. Police had said only two wristwatches and a crystal doll had gone missing during the robbery.
Opposition Leader Edappadi K Palaniswami 
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