The Tamil Nadu police had sought to close the sexual assault case against prominent industrialist R Veeramani, 84, citing lack of evidence but a Pocso court denied the request in February this year, HT has learnt.
Between February and August, police investigations revealed more murky details. The volunteer submitted a pen drive containing disturbing footage of an older man assaulting a minor girl claiming it was handed over to him by an unidentified man. Veeramani, however, wasn’t arrested.
The case against Veeramani – who has been in jail along with two accomplices since August — was lodged on October 6, 2025 after a volunteer working in a trust run by the industrialist filed a complaint with the police’s central crime branch (CCB). Besides, the police were not able to ascertain the age and identity of the victim in the purported video which was taken in 2019 as per the watermark in the surveillance video. The officer said police unearthed an SMS from Shanthi in which she seems to be informing Veeramani that one of the victims allegedly died by suicide and the message was referring to an incident in 2003.
The police officer said the case was not officially closed but kept open on the condition that the investigations will be revived if fresh evidences surfaced.
One reason for the delay in arresting Veeramani under the Pocso Act was that the video footage of the crime was blurry, prevented police from confirming the suspect’s identity, an officer said on the condition of anonymity. “There were no other grounds to investigate further leading the police to drop the investigation,” he said.
