Published Sep 24, 2026 | 3:04 PM ⚊ Updated Sep 24, 2026 | 8:35 PM
Director-General of Police Mahesh Kumar Aggarwal ordered the formation of the SIT, comprising four women police officers.
Synopsis: The top cop in Tamil Nadu transferred three officers, including two senior IPS officers, in connection with the POCSO case against Gem Granites founder R Veeramani. One of the officers, Yasmin, who led the Anti-Vice Squad, investigated the case and recommended closing it. The development follows revelations that the Tamil Nadu police knew about the allegations as early as 2024, rather than a year later, as the police have maintained.
Three senior police officers were transferred on Thursday, 24 September, in connection with the POCSO case against Gem Granites founder R Veeramani.
Additional Director General of Police A Arun has been put under compulsory wait at the office of the DGP/Head of Police Force in Chennai. Similarly, N. Kannan, Inspector General of Police/Commissioner of Police, Coimbatore City, has also been put under compulsory wait at the DGP’s office. Arun was previously the Chennai police commissioner.
The two senior IPS officers came under scrutiny in the POCSO case after Congress functionary, MP Ranjan Kumar, said he had submitted a complaint to then Additional Commissioner N Kannan in November 2024. Kannan said he had escalated the matter to then Chennai Police Commissioner Arun.
Their transfers to compulsory wait are being viewed as part of the government’s directive to take action against those responsible for delaying or suppressing the case.
Soon after the two officers were transferred, the DGP transferred MA Yasmin, Assistant Commissioner, Koyambedu Range, Greater Chennai Police, to the Chief Office Vacancy Reserve on administrative grounds with immediate effect. She has been directed to report to the DGP’s office for further posting.
Yasmin, who was then with the Anti-Vice Squad and handled the initial POCSO case, including filing the closure report.
Earlier, Chennai Police summoned three police officers who were part of the earlier investigation team.
Officers Yasmin, then Assistant Commissioner of the Anti-Vice Squad, and Inspectors Mahesh Kumar and Rajalakshmi were questioned about the circumstances under which the case was closed after the police received a pen drive and registered an FIR, who instructed the police to seek closure of the case.
Yasmin had earlier received appreciation from former Chief Minister MK Stalin in 2022, while serving as DSP in Musiri, for resolving 97 percent of petitions concerning the police department through the Ungal Thoguthiyil Stalin initiative.
The development follows revelations that the Tamil Nadu police knew about the allegations as early as 2024, rather than a year later, as the police have maintained.
A complaint purportedly submitted by Tamil Nadu Congress SC Department president MP Ranjan Kumar to the Chennai Police on 21 November 2024 has been widely circulated.
In the complaint, Ranjan Kumar alleged that several minor girls, including children from marginalised, minority and Dalit communities, were being sexually abused at a residence allegedly associated with Veeramani and Shanthi.
He said video-recorded evidence of alleged sexual abuse involving minor girls had been handed over to him and urged the police to take stringent action against Veeramani and Shanthi.
The first case into the allegations, however, was registered a year later by the Anti-Vice Squad of the Greater Chennai Police on 7 October 2025, after a child welfare volunteer handed over a pen drive to an inspector.
The volunteer said an unidentified person had given him the device at his office, claiming that it contained a video of Veeramani allegedly committing a sexual offence against a minor girl in the bedroom of a house belonging to Shanthi.
The police examined the video and found footage showing an adult man allegedly committing a sexual offence against a minor girl. The Anti-Vice Squad subsequently registered a case under the POCSO Act.
The police later sought closure of the case, citing “lack of evidence”. In its closure report filed before the special POCSO court in Chennai, the agency said the incident shown in the video had occurred in 2019 and that the identity and whereabouts of the minor girl were not known.
The agency also relied on eyewitness statements and statements from Veeramani, Shanthi and her husband, Mahendra Simhan, to state that the man seen in the video was not Veeramani.
The special POCSO court rejected the closure report on 19 August and ordered further investigation, giving the agency four weeks to complete it.
Veeramani was arrested in August along with Shanthi and her husband, Mahendra Simhan, in connection with the case.
(Edited by Dese Gowda with inputs from Subash Chandra Bose)
