The Madras High Court Bench here on Tuesday directed Crime Branch-Criminal Investigation Department (CB-CID) to explain by Friday the reason for the delay in commencing the trial in a case registered against former Union Minister M.K. Alagiri’s one-time close aide V.P. Pandi alias ‘Attack’ Pandi on a charge of murdering the former’s confidante N. Suresh Babu alias ‘Pottu’ Suresh at TVS Nagar here on January 31, 2013.
Justice G. Jayachandran issued the direction on petitions preferred by Pandi seeking bail in the case and another attempt to murder case registered in 2015. Seeking interim bail too on health grounds since he was suffering from jaundice and admitted to Government Rajaji Hospital here at present, the petitioner said he had been under incarceration since his arrest in Mumbai in September 2015.
During the course of hearing, it was also brought to the notice of the judge that while dismissing his earlier bail applications in September 2016, Justice C.T. Selvam had ordered that the trial in both the cases against him should be expedited and completed within six months. The attempt to murder case was registered on the basis of a complaint lodged by S. Ramakrishnan, a childhood friend of ‘Pottu’ Suresh and one of the witnesses in the latter’s murder case.
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