Even after the Madurai Bench of Madras High Court granted bail to audiotape case accused Nirmala Devi on Tuesday, the suspended Assistant Professor of Devanga Arts College in Aruppukottai, continued to remain in jail, as her close relatives did not come forward to provide surety, fulfilling the bail conditions.
Ms. Nirmala Devi was arrested in April 2018 after a telephonic conversation she had with a few college girls in which she was heard inducing them to do certain favours for higher officials of Madurai Kamaraj University in exchange for higher marks and money. As several of her bail pleas were rejected, she was in the Central Prison, Madurai for 11 months.
Only after the High Court came down heavily on the investigating agency, Crime Branch - Criminal Investigation Department, for not allowing her bail even after filing of chargesheet, she got the bail. “In the last 11 months, Nirmala Devi has not been contacted by her close family members. They have been threatened against meeting her and also moving her bail applications. This has forced them to keep away from her,” her advocate S. Pasumpon Pandian claimed.
Even after he attempted to contact two of her close relatives after obtaining bail, they refused to talk. “With the Court laying conditions that two persons - a blood relative and a friend - have to produce surety, I am talking to some of her relatives to help her come out of the jail,” he said.
