Dinakaran seeks bail in AIADMK symbol case

According to court sources, Dinakaran, who was arrested on April 25 and is at present in judicial custody, sought the relief saying he was ready to cooperate in the investigation.

Special Judge Poonam Chaudhry listed his bail plea for hearing tomorrow.

The court would also hear tomorrow the bail plea of Dinakaran's close aide Mallikarjuna, who is also in judicial custody.

It would also hear arguments on Delhi Police plea seeking consent of Dinakaran and arrested alleged middleman Sukesh Chandrashekar for taking their voice samples.

While Chandrashekar refused to give his consent for voice samples, Dinakaran has sought a copy of a CD which allegedly has audio recordings of phone conversations involving him, Chandrashekar and others.

Alleged hawala operator Nathu Singh, an accused in the case, is also lodged in judicial custody till May 29.

The Crime Branch of Delhi Police has submitted in the court that they needed the voice samples for the probe into the Rs 50-crore graft case.

Police said they have a CD containing audio recordings of the phone conversations allegedly involving Dinakaran, Chandrashekar and others and they wanted to compare the audios with the voice samples.

Dinakaran was arrested here on the night of April 25 after four days of questioning for allegedly attempting to bribe unidentified EC officials to get the undivided AIADMK's 'two leaves' election symbol.

His faction had hoped to obtain the symbol for by- election to the R K Nagar Assembly seat in Tamil Nadu, which was later on cancelled by the EC after the alleged irregularities were reported in the media.

The EC had frozen the AIADMK's symbol after two factions of the party -- one led by Dinakaran's aunt Sasikala and the other by former chief minister O Panneerselvam -- staked a claim to it.

Dinakaran has been accused of allegedly arranging money from undisclosed sources and getting it transferred from Chennai to Delhi through illegal channels.

Mallikarjuna was arrested for allegedly facilitating the Rs 50 crore deal between Dinakaran and Chandrashekar, who was arrested on April 16.

Singh was held on the night of April 27 with the police claiming that he was given Rs 1 crore to be handed over to Chandrashekar. The money was meant to be paid as a bribe officials in the EC, the police have claimed.