Nirmala Devi gets bail 11 months after arrest

After spending 11 months in prison, Nirmala Devi, former assistant professor of a private college in Aruppukottai, was granted bail on Tuesday by the Madurai Bench of Madras High Court in the audio tape leak case. Nirmala Devi was taken to the court from Madurai central prison amid tight security.

Devi, was arrested on April 16 last year by Aruppukottai Town police on charges of allegedly luring girl students to extend favours to senior officials of the Madurai Kamaraj University (MKU) in return for higher marks and money. An audio-clip of her purported conversation with students had also gone viral on social media.

A bail plea filed by Devi came up for hearing before Justice M Dhandapani on Tuesday, where she claimed that she had been imprisoned for eleven months, but was not given bail even after the CB CID filed its final charge sheet in the case. Further, the petitioner said co-accused V Murugan, assistant professor, formerly with the MKU and S Karuppasamy, former research scholar of the university, had already been granted bail by the SC in the case. The State counsel did not object to the petitioner’s prayer.

The judges directed her to fully cooperate with police in the investigation and barred her from giving any interview to the media that would harm the probe. Devi’s counsel Pasumpon Pandian said efforts were on to get her released from the Madurai central prison on Thursday.