The Madras High Court on Wednesday (October 15, 2025) directed former Chief Minister Jayalalithaa’s niece and legal heir J. Deepa to implead her brother J. Deepak too as one of the respondents to a writ petition filed by her challenging the recovery of income tax and wealth tax dues, to the tune of ₹13.69 crore, by her aunt.
Justice C. Saravanan granted time till November 3 for the petitioner to implead her brother since Income Tax department senior standing counsel A.P. Srinivas told the court that though both the siblings had been declared as the legal heirs of the former Chief Minister, Mr. Deepak had not challenged the recovery proceedings.
The court was informed that the Tax Recovery Officer had initially passed an order on July 23, 2025 for recovering a much larger sum of ₹36.56 crore, assessed to be the arrears to be paid by the former Chief Minister from the assessment years 1991-92 to 2011-12, from the two legal heirs who had inherited her properties.
Ms. Deepa filed a first writ petition on August 7, 2025 challenging the recovery on the grounds that any notice, assessment, or recovery proceeding issued in the name of a deceased person was wholly void ab initio and unenforceable and that the writ petitioner could not be termed as an assessee in default.
