Sidelined AIADMK leader T.T.V. Dhinakaran on Monday claimed that he was in possession of video footage showing former Chief Minister Jayalalithaa watching television during her hospitalisation at the Apollo Hospitals here, and that he would hand it over to any panel constituted to probe her death.
Speaking to reporters here, Mr. Dhinakaran said that while CCTV footage would only be available with the management of the hospital, his aunt and Jayalalithaa’s aide V.K. Sasikala shot some footage during the hospitalisation of the former Chief Minister.
Since the footage showed Jayalalithaa in a ‘nightie’ (a night dress), it was not released earlier, he said. She had “lost weight” and it wouldn’t have been appropriate to release the footage back then, he added.
“None would have seen Amma (Jayalalithaa) in a nightie, not even any [party] functionary. Even when [former Prime Minister] Rajiv Gandhi visited Amma after she met with an accident in 1989, she was fully attired. She always maintained that dignity,” Mr. Dhinakaran said, adding that his aunt had advised against using it for the by-election campaign in the Dr. Radhakrishnan Nagar constituency.
“Let the probe be done by the CBI or Interpol. The first person to be investigated would be none other than [Deputy Chief Minister] O. Panneerselvam, since he was holding the portfolio of the Chief Minister back then,” Mr. Dhinakaran said.
He also insisted that the probe should be led by a sitting judge and not a retired judge.