Kollam: A Public Interest Litigation has been filed in the Kerala High Court alleging corruption against Kerala State Cashew Workers Apex Industrial Co-operative Society Ltd (Capex).
According to the petition, the public sector company incurred a loss of Rs 100 crore owing to corruption in just five years. Demanding a CBI probe, the litigation also points out that the Vigilance is yet to register an FIR in the case.
It is learnt that the total loss incurred by Capex since its inception in 1984 until 2011 is Rs 86.87 crore. However, the loss incurred from 2011 to 2016 is estimated at Rs 100 crore. One Mr R. Jayachandran had been appointed as the managing director of Capex in 2011. “Before this MD took charge, Capex was on working profit which steeply fell because of its deals with JMJ traders, that was blacklisted by Capex. About 90 per cent of cashew purchase was with the controversial JMJ traders,” petitioner Kadakampally Manoj told this newspaper.
“I had filed a petition with Vigilance in June 2016 which conducted quick verification and according to the report it had found huge corruption at Capex. The report also recommended a CBI probe as the trade was mostly overseas. The government has not yet taken any action on this recommendation,” he alleged.
In the meantime, the secretary to home department of Government of Kerala issued an order dated 29.3.2017 which directed that before registering an FIR, sanction of the Director of Vigilance Department should be obtained, which is against an order by the Supreme Court that on receipt of information of cognisable offence, the S.H.O. is bound to register an F.I.R. under Section 154 CrPC. In one Lalithakumari case, the Supreme Court had also ordered that a preliminary inquiry should be completed within 42 days and thereafter register FIR if materials are available.
The petitioner has also pleaded to take action to discard the circular issued by the Vigilance as several investigation reports have been kept in pending, apparently freezing the Vigilance wing.
