Kerala High Court for CBI probe a blow to govt
State yet to remove Cashew corp MD
Kochi: The High Court order entrusting the investigation into the fraudulent transactions in the Kerala State Cashew Development Corporation (KSCDC) to the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) has put paid to the attempts by the State cabinet to limit the probe to the state Vigilance and Anti-Corruption Bureau.
The cabinet which approved the report submitted by an expert committee headed by Industries principal secretary P H Kurian had ordered the vigilance probe, however, has still not implemented the other key recommendation to remove the managing director K A Ratheesh and supersede the board of directors, headed by INTUC state president R Chandrasekharan.
The clearance for the vigilance probe was seen as an attempt to convince the court that the state government had already seized of the matter and avoid a CBI investigation.
It was the determined efforts by a former employee of KSCDC Kadakampally Manoj and two top bureaucrats -- additional chief secretary (finance) K M Abraham and principal secretary (industries) P H Kurian that resulted in the Kerala High Court ordering the CBI investigation.
Mr Manoj had submitted before the court the reports of various agencies which investigated the allegations of corruption. “I hope the CBI enquiry will establish what I have been saying all these years: what was happening in KSCDC was daylight robbery,” he told Deccan Chronicle.
Mr Kurian, who headed the investigation, had listed the irregularities in the transactions in the corporation, especially in the purchase of the raw material. It also found that the corporation had violated all norms applicable to public sector units in their transactions.
Mr Abraham had, in an unusual move, bypassed the office of the advocate-general and submitted a report directly to the High Court. He pointed out in the report that the state cabinet overruled the finance ministry’s objections and cleared '36 lakh for advertisements issued by the corporation condemning the investigation by the expert committee.