Madras HC declares Deepa & Deepak as Jaya’s straight heirs

Chennai: A couple of days after declaring J Jayalalithaa’s relatives Deepa and her brother Deepak as second class legal heirs of the former Chief Minister, the Madras High Court today declared them as straight heirs of the late leader.

Hours after the verdict, Deepa met the media and claimed that there was a threat to the lives of her and her brother and requested adequate protection.

“We didn’t expect this verdict,” she said and added that she was being targeted since she was raising questions against AIADMK men. The Madras High Court verdict declaring herself and her brother as the legal heirs of Jayalalithaa was a landmark one, the former AIADMK supremo’s niece said.

It will ‘speak for everybody’ in the country, Deepa, one of the petitioners in the case, said. Allowing the petition by Deepa and her Deepak, seeking letters of administration to administer Jayalalithaa’s properties, a High Court bench n Wednesday said “Deepak and Deepa are second class legal heirs of the late CM, being the son and daughter of her late brother Jayakumar.”

Responding to it, Deepa said: “This judgement is so strong that it is going to stand. It is a landmark judgement, not just for us…such injustice should not happen to any citizen of India….this judgement will speak for everybody.”

Deepa told reporters that the court has upheld her and Deepak as the legal heirs and therefore it will be applicable to all of the late leader’s properties, including estates, even as it was ‘established’ that there was no written will by Jayalalithaa bequeathing them to someone else.