Tamil Nadu Chief Minister C. Joseph Vijay has claimed ownership over 50 cents of government poromboke land at Vilpatti village in Kodaikanal, falsely declared a property sold by him for ₹35 crore at Padi in Chennai as his property worth ₹7 crore and wrongly termed his Neelangarai bungalow as inherited property, an election petitioner has claimed before the Madras High Court.
However, Mr Vijay said the allegations against him were baseless and the petition must be dismissed.
In the petition pending before Justice V. Lakshminarayanan, S. Dinesh, a voter from Perambur constituency, insisted the election of the Chief Minister must be declared null and void for “wilful and deliberate” suppression, misrepresentation and false declarations with respect to many of the immovable properties referred to in his 2026 election affidavit.
According to the petitioner’s counsel V.R. Shanmuganathan, Mr. Vijay had claimed to have purchased the Vilpatti agricultural land for a consideration of ₹30,000 in 1997. Mr Vijay had also said, the present market value of that property was around ₹20 lakh. However, an examination of the village ‘A’ register revealed the property was actually a government poromboke land, the counsel claimed.
Similarly, the Chief Minister had declared to have purchased a non agricultural land measuring 33,955 square feet at Porur in Chennai for a consideration of ₹9.13 crore in 2010. However, examination of registration department documents revealed that he had purchased only 20,773 square feet for ₹7.5 crore. There was no explanation for excess declaration of the extent of the land as well as the sale amount, the petitioner alleged.
He went on to state that Mr. Vijay had declared to be owning a ₹7 crore worth 11,854 sq.ft commercial building at Padi in Chennai and claimed to have purchased it for a consideration of ₹1.95 crore in 2009 besides spending ₹3.9 crore on construction. However, he had sold the commercial building with a constructed area of 23,460 sq.ft for a consideration of ₹35 crore on February 12, 2026, the petitioner claimed.
Further, the court was told he had not purchased the commercial property in 2009 as it had been declared in the election affidavit and instead received it in exchange for his Korattur property from Tamil Nadu Housing Board. The petitioner said, the Chief Minister had not disclosed that the property was acquired through a deed of exchange and that it was sold away for ₹35 crore much before the filing of the election affidavit.
In so far as the Neelangarai bungalow was concerned, the election petitioner said, it was not inherited. The Chief Minister’s father S.A. Chandrasekhar had purchased it from Sumathi Raghunath Gaitonde in 2003 and settled it in favour of his son in 2005. The settlement deed stated the father was giving away the property to the son without receiving any consideration out of love and affection.
The 2005 settlement deed had declared the value of the property spread over 17,100 sq.ft of land area and a 5,500 square feet building to be ₹2.75 crore. However, in his 2026 election affidavit, the Chief Minister had claimed to have spent ₹18.73 crore to put up 18,633 sq.ft of built up area on the land and that the market value of the property at present was around ₹20 crore, the petitioner pointed out.
Chief Minister’s reply
Filing an application to reject the election petition at the threshold without taking it for the long drawn process of trial, the Chief Minister said, all the allegations levelled against him in the election petition were false, unfounded, baseless and completely misconceived. He said, the allegations were unsupported by the requisite particulars and were based on conjectures and surmises.
“The entire election petition runs into pages and pages of microscopic dissection of my Form 26 with an item wise allegation of fluctuations in value of properties declared therein, whether or not these fluctuations are material or not... Even if it is assumed (though not admitted) that the contents of the entire election petition are true and correct, it would not disclose any cause of action,” the applicant said.
Mr. Vijay told the court: “No attempt has been made (by the election petitioner) to show how these imaginary perceived defects have affected the outcome of the election in any manner. The people of the constituency knew they were voting for a well known cinema actor who is also a very good human being and someone who offered them a realistic, honest and promising political alternative.”
He went on to state: “They were certainly aware that I owned properties in and around the State. Not a single voter would have exercised their ballot differently if the value of one of this respondent’s properties were more or less by a small sum. This is not to say that the Form 26 is inaccurate. The Form 26 as filed was free from any defect and the nomination was properly accepted.”
Highlighting he had secured 1,20,365 votes and won by a margin of 53,715 votes in Perambur constituency, the Chief Minister said, his election could not be nullified on flimsy allegations. “The allegation of corrupt practice is even more flimsy. There is not even a sentence in the election petition about who interfered with the free exercise of electoral right and whose electoral right was interfered with,” he added.
Further, relying upon declaration of properties worth over ₹600 crore in his election affidavit, Mr. Vijay said: “It is not the case of the election petitioner that I disclosed no assets at all or that I hold assets disproportionate to my known sources of income... His case is of alleged technical discrepancies... A difference of such character in respect of the extent of land, sale consideration, built-up area, market value or the description of the mode of acquisition of an asset, which stands disclosed, cannot be considered substantial in nature.”
Justice Lakshminarayanan has commenced hearing arguments on the Chief Minister’s plea to reject the election petition. Senior counsel Gopal Sankaranarayanan, assisted by Pranjal Agarwal and Dixita Gohil, argued the matter on behalf of Mr. Vijay for the last two days. The case has been adjourned to Wednesday (October 7, 2026) for hearing the other side.
