Karnataka public prosecutor and senior advocate B.V. Acharya on Wednesday questioned in the Supreme Court how Tamil Nadu CM Jayalalithaa, who received a salary of one rupee a month for 27 months during 1991 to 1996, could amass disproportionate assets of Rs 66 crore. Continuing his arguments before a bench of Justices Pinaki Chandra Ghose and Amitav Roy, the senior counsel argued that under the provisions of the Prevention of Corruption Act, the burden of proving the legal means of income was on the accused, but in this case they could not do so. He said the other accused floated benami companies and acquired wealth disproportionate to known sources of income. As sought by the bench on Tuesday, Mr Acharya produced a chart of the loans obtained by the accused from various banks during the check period and how the amounts were treated as income by the trial court and high court.
Finding fault in the high court verdict acquitting the four accused — Jayalalithaa, Sasikala, Ilavarasi and Sudhagaran — Mr Acharya said the trial court had rendered a finding on each of the counts of assets and expenses and came to the conclusion that about Rs 53 crore was the disproportionate assets amount after accounting for Rs 13 crore towards expenses, but the high court had reversed the findings. He pointed out that the single judge committed a grave mistake in totalling 10 items of loan by arriving at a figure of Rs 24,17,31,274 when actually, on proper totalling, the same ought to be Rs 10,67,31,274, resulting in the erroneous decision that the disproportionate assets were only 8.12 per cent of the income.
He said that according to the single judge, the disproportionate assets were Rs 37,59,02,466 and income Rs 34,76,65,654, and since the DA was only Rs 2,82,32,812, which is 8.12 per cent in excess of the income, he was acquitting the accused. If the error in totalling alone is corrected, the DA comes to Rs 16,32,36,812 and DA is 76.70 per cent of income.
The judge also erred in holding that loans from nationalised banks were not taken into consideration by the prosecuting agency while, in fact, the same were taken into consideration. Arguments will continue on Thursday.
