At a time when Rajinikanth is mulling to launch his own political party and test the waters in the state for his political entry, his family leaving no stone unturned to ensure that his image is in no way tainted.
The Ashram School, owned by the actor's wife Latha Rajinikanth and was in the news for non-payment of rent to the land owner, seems to have caused a huge damage to the clean image of the superstar. Apparently, his daughter Aishwarya Dhanush, who is the secretary of Ragavendhra Educational Trust that runs the school in Guindy has gone to the court seeking Rs.6 crore damages from the land owner Venkateswarulu and his family members. She has demanded Rs 5 crore as compensation for defamation caused by Venkatswaralu and Rs 1 crore for wrongful locking of the school.
The defamation suit is filed in the capacity as secretary of the Sree Raghavendra Educational Society which runs the Ashram Matriculation School in three places—Saidapet, Guindy and Velacherry—in Chennai. On August 16, the school premises was reportedly forcibly locked by Venkateswaralu and his men and the students were made to shift to the Velacherry branch.
Mentioning that the school was functioning in the premises since 2005, she said, the society had spent several crores to turn the 14-ground industrial space into a school premises on the Velachery main road in Guindy. She contended in the petition that an amount of Rs 4.52 lakh towards the pending dues were paid to Venkateswaralu till May 2017. She also said a suit filed by the land owner for recovery of arrears and enhanced rent is still pending in the court and asked “why he locked the premises, putting children into hardship.”
Stating that Venkateswaralu’s claim of rental dues were false and misleading she filed the defamation suit against him and four of his family members—Poorna Chandra Rao, Padma, Prabhakar and Balaji. The defamation suit was filed before Justice C.V Karthikeyan by her advocate T.T Ravichandran. The judge had granted permission to move the suit on Tuesday for admission.
Though the petition says there are no dues to the land owner from the educational society run by the family, the locking of the premises and the news about non-payment of rent has caused a dent in Rajinikanth’s image who has been talking against corruption.
