Three students from Tamil Nadu Agricultural University, Coimbatore (TNAU) were burned to death in a bus by AIADMK cadres after the conviction of Jayalaitha by a special court for the Kodaikanal Pleasant Stay Hotel case.

[3][4] After this incident then Chief Minister M. Karunanidhi ordered a CB-CID investigation, and Jayalalithaa demanded a CBI probe to ensure a fair trial.

In the Pleasant Stay hotel case, a special-court ruling by Justice V. Radhakrishnan convicted Jayalalithaa and sentenced her to one year of "rigorous imprisonment".

Latha (a lecturer accompanying the students) called TNAU's vice-chancellor, who recommended that they go to a safe place and return to Coimbatore when it was safer.

[21] The witnesses included three Tamil Nadu State Transport Corporation drivers and people working in, or owning, establishments near the incident location.

Drivers Saleem Basha of the Coimbatore-Hosur bus and Kamaraj recanted initial statements made to the CB-CID that they could identify the persons involved; they drove buses which were damaged that day in Erapatti and near the Patchaiamman temple, respectively.

[30][31] However, the sentences were commuted to life imprisonment after defence lawyers L. Nageswara Rao and Sushil Kumar said that the AIADMK mob only aimed to damage buses, not kill; they had acted impulsively.

[16][10] It was learned that Dharmapuri AIADMK leader D. K. Rajendran, the first suspect in the case which organized the road protest (with a seven-year conviction which was reduced to two years), held four positions in a cooperative milk society become known.

[32][17][15] A granite memorial with the names of the three victims was built at the Tamil Nadu Agricultural University hostel; all were 20 years old at the time of their deaths.