Tamil Nadu Congress workers protest Karti Chidambaram arrest

Members of the Congress in Tamil Nadu on Thursday staged a protest here against the arrest of Karti Chidambaram, son of former union finance minister P Chidambaram in connection with INX Media case with Congress leaders questioning the mental status of Indrani Mukerjea, the director of the company.

Staging a protest at Valluvarkottam here where over 200 cadres gathered, state Congress leader Peter Alphonse questioned the mental status of Indrani who has been in jail for two years and how could her confessional statement be relied on. "Karti's arrest is a case of a political vendetta by the BJP-led NDA government at the Centre," he claimed.

Hitting out at the media, he said that so-called confession statements recorded from Indrani were not submitted to the court. "I want to ask the media where you got the copy of the confession statements. Have you got it from the court? These are deliberately done by the planted media. Paid media, I will call it," he told reporters after the protest. He went on to assert that there was no confessional statement before the court. "Even in the remand report, there was no mention of it," he said.

Former state Congress chief Kumari Anandan accused the BJP of arresting Karti only to silence former Union minister Chidambaram who have been exposing the irregularities in the Central government. "Nirav Modi has escaped from the country after cheating the bank of over Rs 12,000 crore. Whereas Karti who went to London after getting the permission from Madras High Court was arrested by the CBI on his return to the country. Karti's arrest is a challenge to every congressman. I urge the Narendra Modi government from stopping doing vendetta politics," he said.

Echoing his party colleague's views, former Chennai deputy mayor 'Karate' Thiagarajan said there were five IAS officers who facilitated the FIPB clearance. "How come their names are not in the FIR?" he wondered.