The politics behind the claim for Jayalalithaa’s Poes Garden bungalow

In the ever-lasting battle for J Jayalalithaa’s legacy, her palatial bungalow in upscale Poes Garden here worth over Rs 100 crore seems to be the new playground.

The battle is now being played out between the Tamil Nadu government and Jayalalithaa’s nephew Deepak Jeyakumar, who along with his sister Deepa, has been declared as legal heirs of the former Chief Minister who died in 2016 after 75 days of hospitalisation.

Nearly two months after the court declared him and his sister as legal heirs, Deepak has now approached the Madras High Court seeking keys of the sprawling mansion, thickening the plot. Deepa is silent on the issue and efforts to reach her proved futile.

The nephew of Jayalalithaa was the cynosure of all eyes at her burial after he performed the last rites along with V K Sasikala, the long-time aide of the late leader who is now cooling her heels at the Parapana Agrahara prison in Bengaluru.

Since then, Deepak has been identified with the Sasikala camp and his moving the court gives room to speculation whether he is acting on behalf of the long-time aide of Jayalalithaa.

On the other hand, the AIADMK government, now helmed by Edappadi K Palaniswami, has been quietly moving to take possession of the sprawling mansion and convert it into a memorial for the late leader.

The timing of the government’s move is suspect as its efforts come at a time there is mounting speculation over the release of Sasikala from the prison by the end of this year or early next year.

From promulgating an ordinance for taking over the prime property for converting it into a memorial to agreeing to the Madras High Court’s suggestion to transform the bungalow into the official residence of the Tamil Nadu Chief Minister, the government’s motive seems to be clear.

To ensure Sasikala, who lived with Jayalalithaa in the Poes Garden residence since the 1980s, does not stake a claim to the property and the legacy of the late leader. And, it is a fact that Sasikala was staying at the bungalow till February 15, 2017, even after Jayalalithaa’s death, before leaving for Bengaluru to serve her four-year jail term in a disproportionate assets (DA) case. The government, though, will now have to issue notice to the legal heirs and follow the due process to acquire the bungalow.

Though Palaniswami, then considerably low-weight politician, was hand-picked by Sasikala to occupy the Chief Minister’s post, the AIADMK leader has been able to establish himself in the party and as head of the government.

And by leading his party to victory in two crucial by-elections successfully and cutting to size at least two cabinet ministers when he felt they were overstepping their authority, Palaniswami has demonstrated he is no pushover.

And if his government manages to get the bungalow designated as the office-cum-residence of the Chief Minister, what better place for Palaniswami than Jayalalithaa’s abode to claim her legacy a few months before the state goes into the crucial assembly polls in May 2021.

“If the government manages to convert the bungalow into the official residence of the Chief Minister, it will certainly be a major boost to Palaniswami. One should remember Poes Garden was the Mecca for AIADMK cadre and throwing open the bungalow for people will only boost Palaniswami’s political stock,” senior journalist R Bhagwan Singh told DH.

Poes Garden is not just a property. It was Jayalalithaa’s abode for nearly 50 years from the late 1960s till the day she was wheeled out of the bungalow on a September night in 2016 to be admitted at Apollo Hospitals and served as one of the powerful addresses in Tamil Nadu for nearly three decades.

A trip to Poes Garden was nothing short of a pilgrimage for an average AIADMK cadre and this explains why there are multiple claims over the bungalow, which is an inextricable part of the legacy that Jayalalithaa has left behind.