india

Updated: Apr 26, 2019 12:53 IST

The Supreme Court on Friday put on hold proceedings before judicial commission set up by the Tamil Nadu government to probe AIADMK Chief J Jayalalithaa’s death.

The order by a bench led by Chief Justice of India Ranjan Gogoi came on a petition filed by the Chennai-based Apollo hospital where the AIADMK matriarch had died in December 2016 after 75 days of treatment.

The judicial inquiry was ordered by the Edappadi K Palaniswami government seven months later.

Deputy Chief Minister O Panneerselvam had been among the first AIADMK leaders to fuel the theory that there was something suspicious about the circumstances around Jayalalithaa’s death. Like when he was struggling to retain the chief minister’s death in February 2017, O Panneerselvam, or OPS as he is called, had complained how he had never got to see her in hospital.

OPS later negotiated a deal with his successor, Chief Minister Palaniswami, to merge his faction with the AIADMK and joined the government as deputy chief minister. A full-fledged inquiry into their leader’s death was a pre-condition for the reunion. The decision to set up the commission was widely seen to be targeting VK Sasikala, the AIADMK matriarch’s long-time aide. She was the only one with access to Jayalalithaa at hospital.

The commission, headed by a retired high court judge, was initially told to wrap up its inquiry within three months. But it has continued to get one extension after another.

Halfway through the commission’s proceedings, Apollo demanded that a 21-member expert medical board be constituted to assist the panel on the correctness of medical procedures and protocols of the treatment.

It had approached the high court, seeking a stay on the panel’s proceedings till such a board was set up. The high court didn’t agree and rejected the argument that a retired judge was not competent to deal with complex and intricate medical treatment provided to Jayalalithaa.

But the high court did rap the commission for some of procedures that were found to be strange. The high court also found that some of the averments made on behalf of the commission were disturbing and unwarranted.