Claiming that N. Vadivel (55) of Arachalur, a Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) cadre, was beaten to death on December 30, 2021, members of the district BJP urged the police to transfer the case to CB-CID.
In a petition submitted to the Superintendent of Police here on Monday, BJP’s district general secretary Gunasekaran alleged that Thambi alias Eswaramoorthy (48) of DMK attacked Vadivel that caused his death. Though the victim’s family had lodged a complaint with the police and there were many eyewitnesses, the police had registered a case of suspicious death, instead of murder.
The petition raised suspicion over the conduct of postmortem as it was not carried by a team of doctors, but only by an individual doctor. The petition said the police were yet to examine the footage of CCTVs installed near the crime spot. Also, an unidentified car arrived near the victim’s house on the day of the murder and the police were yet to conduct an inquiry. The petition claimed that it was a political murder and wanted the inquiry handed over to the CB-CID police.
The district police had, in press releases issued on December 31, 2021 and on January 1, 2022, clarified that an altercation broke out between Vadivel and Thambi over turning on lights on the temple premises at Thalavumalai that led to both attacking each other. The next day, Vadivel was found dead at home, and the police altered the case sections to 294 (b), 427 and 304 (2) of IPC. The release clarified that there was no political motive behind the murder and it happened only due to altercation.
