Ex-MP gets 3 yrs in jail for fraud

MR Venkatesh, Hindustan Times

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Chennai, December 30, 2008

A special court hearing CBI cases has sentenced former PMK MP M Dorai to a three-year jail term for using fraudulent means to get the All India Council For Technical Education’s (AICTE) approval for a couple of private engineering colleges.

Dorai, from Vandavasi constituency — about 150 km from here — had been accused of conspiring to obtain recognition for the colleges belonging to his educational trust in his constituency during the period December 1995 to December 2001.

Justice S. Rangaruju also handed down similar sentences to R. Lakshminarasimhan, then manager of the Vandavasi branch of Indian Bank, S. Mannappan, treasurer of Dorai’s Sambuvarayar Educational Trust, and T.T. Subramanian, the trust’s secretary. The accused were also fined Rs 10,000 for each charge proved.

The CBI alleged Dorai had submitted false documents to the AICTE in April 1998 to show that his trust had a fixed deposit of Rs 25 lakh — to become around Rs 81.50 lakh at the end of 10 years — with Indian Bank. Having proof of such deposits is mandatory for AICTE approvals.

Lakshminarasimhan has been accused of misusing Rs 25 lakh worth of deposit reinvestment plan (RIP) receipts to create the remittance in the name of the trust without receiving any cash or cheque or transfer voucher.

The judge, however, has suspended the sentences for a month to enable the accused to appeal.

The rush to start private engineering colleges began here in the 1980s during the regime of MG Ramachandran. There are now 237 self-financing engineering colleges under Anna University.