TR Baalu sends ₹100 crore defamation notice to Annamalai

CHENNAI: After State Sports Minister Udhayanidhi Stalin, DMK Parliamentary party leader TR Baalu on Thursday sent a defamation notice to state BJP president K Annamalai demanding an "unconditional public apology" for the allegations made against him on April 14 in a press conference and the DMK Files video clips published in prominent media.

Insisting that Annamalai must remove the video of the said press conference from his social media page and the website www.enmannenmakkal.com, Udhayanidhi, in the defamation notice sent late Thursday, said that the BJP state president must cease and desist in any way from speaking, broadcasting, publishing, sharing, uploading and disseminating or in any way communicating to the public the allegations made against him in the #DMKfiles video. The minister also claimed that Annamalai must pay damages to the tune of Rs 100 crore to him, which he intends to pay over to the Chief Minister's Public Relief Fund.

Denying the allegations Annamalai made against him in the "DMK Files", Baalu threatened to initiate appropriate civil and criminal proceedings against him if he failed to tender an unconditional apology in 48 hours.

Dismissing allegations of his owning 21 companies and assets of companies to the tune of Rs 10,841 crore as "false, baseless, unsubstantiated and defamatory", the DMK treasurer said that the details of his minority shareholding in Kings India Power Corporation, Kings India Chemicals and Meenam Fisheries were shown in the affidavit filed by him during 2019 general elections. The alleged values of the companies mentioned in the slide show are completely false and baseless and not on the basis of any cogent evidence or materials, he added.