One more victim? Toddy tapper claims Sathankulam cops stripped, beat him

A toddy tapper, S Yakobu Raj, a 36-year-old resident of Meerankulam in Sathankulam in Thoothukudi district appeared in Thoothukudi District police office on Thursday after he was summoned for inquiry in connection with the incident.

A few days ago, Raj, the victim, submitted petition to the SP S Jeyakumar that he was booked on false charges under Sections 294 (b), 387 and 506 (ii) of IPC in May this year based on a bogus complaint by S Mahendran (28) of Asirvadhapuram, whom he never knew of and placed his demand for scrapping such false charges and withdraw the case.

The victim, while recalling, said the then Sub Inspector Raghu Ganesh, who’s one of the accused jailed in connection with custodial deaths of P Jayaraj (58) and his son J Bennix (31) last month, picked him from Meerankulam at 7.30 pm, on May 23 and took him to a remote locality at Palaniappapuram, where he’s stripped naked, blindfolded and brutally beaten up for about half-an-hour that made him faint.

Raghu Ganesh did not leave him, but took him to Sathankulam police station blindfolded on the same night and beat him up continuously in the presence of the then Inspector S Srithar, who demanded money to let him out of the case.

As Raj could not cough up the bribe, an FIR was then registered against him. Raj said, Srithar even threatened to kill him if the brutalitywas ever revealed.