M A M Ramasamy, the 82-year-old founder/ patriarch of the business conglomerate Chettinad Cements was ousted as chairman by his adopted son M A M R Muthiah at the August 27 annual general body meeting of the company in Chennai.

The conglomerate has multi-million rupee investments in education, healthcare and infrastructure.

The 43-year-old Muthiah, a US business graduate, was adopted by Ramasamy in the 1990s from his biological parents who are also relatives. The father and son had differences over business expansion. Ramasamy preferred horse racing and other sport activities, while Muthiah was keen to expand the business. He reportedly had the majority support of the conglomerate’s board members.  

In a related development, Manuneethi Cholan, the registrar of companies, was arrested by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) for accepting a bribe of Rs1mn from Ramasamy to veto the Chettinad board decision.  

Many of the board members belonging to the Chettiar community tried to broker peace between father and son but Ramasamy did not attend the August 27 meeting citing poor health.  

 

Alcoholic
falls to death
in Chennai

 

A 62-year-old man fell to his death from the balcony of an apartment on the Velacherry bypass road in Chennai last week.

His wife Susila told police that Kumar, a homoeopathy medicine dealer, was an alcoholic. He was drinking when she left the house to visit a temple nearby.  

In a separate incident, Prabhakaran, an AC mechanic, died when he fell from a ledge of the forest department building at DMS complex in Teyynampet in Chennai. He was filling gas in an air-conditioner when it exploded and he fell to the ground several floors below.

Also in Chennai, a two-year-old boy fell to his death from the second floor of his flat at Otteri. His mother was cooking when the accident happened. Similarly 17-year-old Bhuvaneshwari died after a fall from the first floor of her house in Porur.  

Police said flats with weak handrails and decorative but dangerously wide grill work could have caused these accidents.

 

Woman hurt
in acid attack

A man threw acid on a woman’s face after she rejected his marriage proposal at Sirkazhi in coastal Nagapattinam district last week.

Thangapandian, an employee of a Chennai-based travel agency, was pestering Suba to marry him and even approached her family. However her parents asked him to wait. An angry Thangapandian waylaid her while she was returning from work and threw a bottle of hydrochloric acid on her face.  

Suba, who was severely injured, was rushed to the Sirkazhi government hospital.

Thangapandian was booked under the Tamil Nadu Prohibition of Harassment of Women Act. Support has poured in for Suba from all directions including the parents of Vinodini, an acid victim who died in Karaikal last year. They visited her in hospital and promised financial aid from their daughter’s trust fund.

 

‘Kind’ kidnapper
held in Madurai

A middle-aged man was arrested for kidnapping at least five school girls in the past year and dropping them off at different places in Madurai city.

Police said that Murugan, a daily wage worker, was separated from his wife and two children. Strangely he did not abuse or torture the girls but dropped them off after treating them to snacks and making them sit with him overnight.