Sasikala discharged, checks into resort in Bengaluru

Bengaluru: Former AIADMK leader V.K. Sasikala was discharged on Sunday from the State-run Victoria Hospital here on recovering from Covid-19 and checked into a resort on the city's outskirts for quarantine.

"Sasikala was discharged from the hospital in the afternoon as she completed 10 days of treatment on Saturday. She will be in quarantine at a resort (Prestige Golfshire) towards the city airport as per post-Covid protocols," an Amma Makkal Munnettra Kazagam (AMMK) party source told IANS here. For security reasons, the 66-year-old close aide of late Tamil Nadu Chief Minister J Jayalalithaa was given police escort.

"Chinnamma (Sasikala) left the hospital around 12.10 pm in a car with police escort. Our (AMMK) founder and Sasikala's nephew TV Dinakaran accompanied her to the resort," the source said. About 200 supporters of Sasikala, who assembled outside the hospital, greeted her with flowers when she drove out in the car.

"Dinakaran received Sasikala when she came out of the hospital ward in a wheelchair, wearing a face mask and hand gloves," the source added.

Sasikala was admitted to the hospital on January 21 after she tested positive.

Sasikala was freed from the central jail on January 27 after she completed 4 years of sentence in a disproportionate assets case of Jayalalithaa and on paying Rs 10 crore fine.

Dinakaran floated AMMK in March 2018 as a breakaway faction of the ruling AIADMK, which expelled Saskiala in September 2017 though she was in jail since February 15, 2017. An ailing Jayalalithaa died at a private hospital in Chennai on December 5, 2016.

Sasikala's co-convict and associate J Ilavarsi is under treatment at the same hospital for Covid symptoms after she tested positive on January 23. Sudhakaran is still in prison. A special trial court in September 2013 convicted Jayalalithaa, Sasikala, Ilavarsi and VN Sudhakaran to 4-year imprisonment, with Rs 10-crore fine each.