The Tamil Nadu Government on Monday filed an appeal in the Madras High Court challenging a lower court’s verdict acquitting Sankaracharya Jayendra Saraswathi, the pontiff of the Kanchi Kamakotipeeth and eight others in the 2002 Auditor S Radhakrishnan assault case.
Justice R Subbiah who heard the appeal, ordered notice to all the accused including Jayendra Saraswathi (81) on the maintainability of the plea and adjourned the matter for hearing after two weeks.
Monday happened to be the birthday of Jayendra Saraswathi and the appeal against the trial court order is seen by the devotees of the Mutt as Tamil Nadu Government’s “birthday greetings” to the Pontiff.
The First Additional Sessions Judge P Rajamanickam, the trial court judge, on April 2016 had acquitted all the accused. The prosecution case was that Radhakrishnan, a former auditor of the Kanchi Mutt, and his wife were assaulted by a gang on September 20, 2002 as a result of the conspiracy hatched by the pontiff. The prosecution further charged that the seer suspected the former auditor of sending anonymous letters in the name of Somasekhara Ganapathigal highlighting the irregularities in the Mutt. Both Radhakrishnan and his wife were seriously injured in the attack.
Jayendra Saraswathi, who was upset over the development asked Sundaresa Iyer, the Mutt manager and Raghu, the brother of his junior Vijayendra Saraswathi “to do something to silence the letter writer”. The Chennai Police had registered a case against Jayendra Saraswathi and 11 others in connection with this case. While one accused Ravi Subramanian turned approver, two died during the trial.
The pontiff was also an accused in the 2004 Sankararaman murder case. Sankararaman, a former devotee of Kanchi Mutt was found murdered in the famous Varadarajaperumal Temple at Kanchi. Jayendra Saraswathi, his junior Vijayendra Saraswathi and 21 others were listed as accused in the case. But in the final verdict all were acquitted following the failure of the witnesses to establish the role of the monks in the conspiracy to eliminate Sankararaman.