One of the branches of The Ashram, a school being run by Latha Rajinikanth, has been shut down because of non-payment of rent.
Manigandan KR
One of the branches of The Ashram, a school run by Latha Rajinikanth, the wife of Tamil superstar Rajinikanth, has been shut down.
Sources say the owners of the venue chose to close the school at Guindy as the administration had defaulted on the payment of rent.
Reports suggest that the children studying in this school will now be sent to another branch of The Ashram that is in Velacherry.
Media reports cite the owner of the building Venkateswarulu as having said that they had to resort to the move as the school administration had not paid them rent from 2009 and that the pending amount was around Rs10 crore.
Venkateswarulu said that when they went to court demanding the pending sum of Rs10 crore from Latha's school, the school administration said it would pay Rs2 crore as the first instalment. However, they hadn't paid that sum either. The owners also claimed that the school administration had agreed to pay them a sum of Rs10 lakh as rent every month in front of the judge. However, they claimed that the school authorities were only paying them the old rent amount.
The school administration, for its part, has denied all claims that the school had been shut because of rent dues not being paid.
"We request the public not to believe what is being said. Rent has been duly paid to the owners. The future of our students will not be affected in any way. We plan to file a defamation case against the owners," Ravichandran, the lawyer representing The Ashram group of publications, told mediapersons at a press conference.