Former AIADMK MP KN Ramachandran was convicted and sentenced to 7 years in prison by a Special Court for MPs and MLAs for bank fraud. KN Ramachandran is the Chairman cum Managing Trustee of M/s Kannamal Educational Trust and a former AIADMK MP from Sriperumbudur constituency.
Two other persons were also convicted in this criminal case filed by the CBI - Ramachandran’s son R Rajasekaran who is the Chairman of M/s Sakthi Mariamman Engineering College and R Thiagarajan, senior regional manager of Central Bank of India, Chennai. While Ramachandran is the third accused in the case, Thiagarajan is the first and Rajasekaran is the second. Ramachandran’s M/s Kannamal Educational Trust is accused number 4 in this case.
According to the police, all three accused persons entered into a criminal conspiracy between July 2012 and September 2013 and availed term loans beyond permissible limits in the name of M/s Kannamal Education Trust, Chennai.
The Hindu reports that Ramachandran and his son Rajasekaran colluded with Thiagarajan and borrowed Rs 17.28 crore in 2013 for the construction of a new college campus.
This money, however, was reportedly spent for other purposes and when their irregular loan repayment was flagged by a bank inquiry, the loan amount was found to be beyond permissible limits. A case was registered by the Anti-Corruption Branch of the CBI, Chennai following which investigations were conducted.
On completion of the trial, all the three accused persons were convicted. While Thiagarajan was sentenced to undergo rigorous imprisonment for five years and to pay a fine of Rs 13.10 lakh, Rajasekaran and Ramachandran were sentenced to undergo rigorous imprisonment for 7 years each and were imposed a fine of Rs 1.11 crore each. Kannamal Educational Trust has been imposed a fine of Rs 15.2 crore.
Ramachandran was elected to Sriperumbudur Lok Sabha constituency in 2014.