Kannur: Known for his conspiratorial skills in the red fortress of Kannur, P.K. Kunhananthan, 70, is the most ‘trustworthy’ comrade for all top CPM leaders from the district including chief minister Pinarayi Vijayan and state secretary Kodiyeri Balakrishnan. Though he was convicted in the TP Chandrasekharan murder, he spent only a few days in prison as he enjoyed parole at his will. The reported attempt by the LDF government to release him citing his age is not surprising to those who know the importance of Kunhananthan among party circles though he is merely an area committee member.
RMP leader K.K. Rema told DC that hectic moves were afoot to release Kunhananthan. “If Kunhananthan speaks out, the bloodstained past of many CPM leaders would be exposed”, she said, adding that the Kolavallur police from Panoor registered her statement as part of the procedures the other day and the officials of the social justice department registered her statement on Friday. “If Kunhananthan sneezes even Pinarayi would shiver," she said.
According to records sourced under Right to Information Act, between 2-6-2016 and 8-7-2017, Kunhananthan was on parole on an average for 16 days in a month. Kunhananthan was already out on parole for more than 300 days and of that, 211 days were during the current LDF regime.
This soft-spoken comrade was never arrested in any murder case earlier, although his name figured in atleast a dozen murder cases, in his political career spanning over more than four decades. It was only in the TP murder that he was accused, interrogated and arrested for the first time, finally getting the dubious title of ‘convict’.
It is to be recalled that CPM had ensured foolproof protection to Kunhananthan when police started tracking him in the TP murder. For almost 50 days, the CPM kept him hidden in party villages and when finally he surrendered, it was before the court evading the police. During the 1990s when the CPM-RSS clashes reached its zenith in Kannur, he had emerged as an essential element in the killing fields. Police officials including former Kannur SP Subhash Babu called him the ‘uncrowned king in CPM.’ Apart from hatching conspiracies, he also functioned as a ‘liaison officer’ between the police and the CPM, arranging culprits to be nabbed, presenting fabricated evidence and arraying weapons to be seized for the police.
