‘Karim got Rs 5 crore mining kickback’

Kozhikode: Elamaram Karim, former industries minister in the LDF government,  is likely to face some heat with the allegation  that P.M. Naushad, confidant and relative of Karim, received Rs 5-crore bribe in connection with  setting up an iron ore mining unit at Chakkittupara village in Kozhikode district.

MSPL, a company having business interests in mining and wind energy in Karnataka and Maharashtra, had received  in-principle sanction for the unit from the LDF government on April 23, 2010.

M.T. Subair, claiming to be a driver of Naushad, told reporters on Tuesday that the transaction took place a week before the  government  cleared  the project. The amount was handed over to Naushad at Mascot Hotel in Thiruvananthapuram, he said, but could not recall the exact date of the transaction.

The amount was received in the forenoon and it  was taken to the residence of Karim at Kovoor in Kozhikode by Naushad and himself in an Innova car, Subair said. “The money was kept under the back seat  and we reached Kozhikode around 12 in the night.

Naushad put the money in a sack and went inside the house of the minister,” he said.  Subair could not say whether the minister was present in the residence at the time.  “After dropping Naushad at the residence, I left for my home near the Medical College by foot,”  he said.

Asked how he knew that the amount  was Rs 5 crore, Subair said that he had heard the conversation over  phone mentioning about Rs 5 crore. Subair had fallen  out with Naushad six months ago after the latter had cheated him and fraudulently acquired his properties.

The Kozhikode district committee of the CPI (ML) called for a transparent probe into the role played by Karim and others in the deal and exemplary punishment for the guilty.  

Opposition Leader V.S. Achuthanandan  said that it was  for the government to probe the allegations.  “Let the government probe it,” he told reporters. Karim  declined to comment  when mediapersons approached him at Palakkad, the venue of the CPM plenum scheduled to begin on Wednesday.