ACB filed charges against Sasikala illegal facilities in Bengaluru prison

The Anti Corruption Bureau (ACB) in Bengaluru has filed a charge sheet against six people, including two senior Karnataka prison officials and V.K. Sasikala, a close aide of former Tamil Nadu Chief Minister Jayalalithaa, in a corruption case of illegally providing preferential facilities while Sasikala was incarcerated in the Central prison in Bengaluru while serving a sentence in a corruption case against Jayalalithaa.

On February 2, during the hearing of a PIL suit brought by K.S. Gita, a 65-year-old social worker and educationist from Chennai, a division bench comprising Chief Justice Ritu Raj Awasthi and Justice Suraj Govindaraj received a submission on the filling of the charge sheet.

The chargesheet was filed on January 7, 2022, after the State Government granted sanction on December 30, 2021, for the prosecution of two senior jail officials, Krishna Kumar and Anitha R., according to ACB attorney Manmohan P.N.
When the illegal privileges were granted to Sasikala and her sister-in-law Ilavarasi, who was also serving a sentence in the prison, Krishna Kumar was the Chief Superintendent and Anitha was the Superintendent of the Central Prison at Parappana Agrahara in Bengaluru.

In the charge sheet, Sasiskala and Ilavarasi were arraigned as accused numbers 5 and 6, respectively, while Krishna Kumar and Anitha were arraigned as accused numbers 1 and 2, respectively. B. Suresh and Gajaraja Makanooru, both from the prison, have been charged as accused 3 and 4 respectively.

They were charged with forgery, using forged documents and electronic data as real, criminal conspiracy, abatement, and Sections 13(1)(c) and 13(2) of the Prevention of Corruption Act, 1988, according to Sections 465, 468, 471, 120B, and 109 of the Indian Penal Code (IPC).

The PIL was filed in early 2021, alleging that the ACB had submitted a First Information Report in 2018 alleging that Sasikala and Ilavarasi had been improperly given preferential prison treatment, but that the investigation had not been completed after three years.

The petition was dismissed on June 11, 2021, by the High Court, which gave ACB two months to conclude the inquiry and file the final investigative report with the jurisdictional court.

The ACB requested more time to file the investigative report in August 2021, citing the fact that its petitions for sanction for prosecuting public officials were still pending with the State Government's competent authority. Following that, the court voiced its displeasure with the Karnataka government's slow response to the ACB's request for sanction.