Mannar PTA case detainee files bail application

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 02 May 2007, 10:53 GMT]
A bail application has been filed in the Sri Lanka's Court of Appeal seeking the release of Sebastiampillai Vethanayagam, 40, a minor employee of the Murungkan government hospital in Mannar district on bail. Vethanayagam is currently detained under the Prevention of Terrorism Act (PTA) since his arrest on October 5 last year by the Murungkan Police, legal sources said.

Ms Vethanayagam Sahajini, wife of the suspect filed the bail application on Monday in the Court of Appeal citing the Officer-in-Charge of the Murungkan Police and Attorney General as the first and second respondents respectively, legal sources said.

The petitioner states in her application that the suspect, her husband is the father of five children, had been employed as a minor employee of the Murungkan hospital and has been residing with his family in a quarters of the Murungkan government hospital, adjacent of the hospital building. The police station is also closely located near the hospital premises.

Her husband had been engaged in cleansing the fish cut into pieces for preparing curry for lunch one the day of his arrest. A police team had entered the house and took him to custody stating he had been giving "secret signals to the enemy," while cleaning fish. Her husband had only attempted to throw some refuse outside the house through the rear window, the petitioner says and urged the court to allow her husband on bail as she and their five children have been suffering to run their day-to-day life without the breadwinner.