KANNUR/THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: Serious differences have cropped between KPCC president V. M. Sudheeran and Home Minister Ramesh Chennithala over policing in Kannur.
While Mr Sudheeran said that the police were booking cases on the basis of the list provided by the CPM, Mr Chennithala said he was not aware of it, but added he would look into it.
Mr Sudheeran alleged that the practice of the police arresting the accused in criminal cases as per the list provided from the CPM offices was back in Kannur after an interval.
He was addressing a gathering organized to protest against the alleged CPM attack on a Congress worker Jagadeep, who has been hospitalised with serious injuries. Mr Sudheeran also visited him in the hospital.
Mr Sudheeran said that if the police had successfully investigated the conspiracy behind the murder of T.P. Chandrasekharan and arrested the real culprits, the political murders in the state would have ended.
“I stand with the demand of K.K. Rema, widow of Chandrasekharan, for a CBI investigation into the conspiracy behind the murder,” he added.
However, Mr Sudheeran later clarified that he was referring to a trend in the past. Sources said Mr Chennithala’s ties with CPM state secretary Kodiyeri Balakrishnan and his predecessor Pinarayi Vijayan have irked Mr Sudheeran.
“There is an allegation that in the Payyannur bomb attack case, the real perpetrators were removed from the culprits’ list. Earlier, former Home Minister Thiruvanchoor Radhakrishnan was stern in booking culprits, but now the police were lax, which shows the nexus between Chennithala and Kannur leaders,” said a Congress source.
Mr Sudheeran usually criticises the government at party forums and not publicly. The custody death at Marangattupilly in Kottayam district had gone against the home department after the government had improved its image post- Aruvikkara by-election and the green signal for the Vizhinjam project.
