I am an anti-corruption crusader: E P Jayarajan

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: Two days after charges of nepotism led him to resign, former industry minister E.P. Jayarajan painted himself as an anti-corruption crusader, a new-age reformer, a patriot and a martyr who had to pay the price for attempting to cleanse the public sector units that had become a ‘den of thieves’. “Not a single person had been appointed illegally. All appointments were made in the most transparent manner,” he said while making a special statement in the Assembly on Monday. If he has resigned, he said it is not because he has done anything wrong but to uphold the "highest of principles".

Jayarajan said that the ‘mafia’ that controlled the PSUs tried to influence him by various means.  “We had plans to revive Malabar Cements and begin production of a low-cost cement brand like Amma cement in Tamil Nadu,” he said. He hinted that his pro-people crusade had hurt the mafia. “I was repeatedly threatened,” he said. When he said he was threatened by “inside and outside” forces, the opposition gave him a round of applause. It was as if they heard him saying that forces inside CPM were also against him. “Forces inside and outside the country,” Jayarajan clarified. He was, in short, the wronged superhero. “I am not the one to be cowed down. Not now, not again,” he said. What’s more, he virtually likened him to a war hero. “You want my blood, don't you,” he asked the opposition. “Here, take some. But I am fighting for my country, and I will continue my fight,” he said.

As he upped his emotional rhetoric, he unwittingly contradicted himself. “The fitness of all these candidates was looked into by the vigilance, and appointments were done only on the basis of a vigilance report,” he said. But later on, while speaking about the KSIE appointment that did him in, he said the “young man” (P.K. Sudheer Nambiar) was appointed on the basis of “special conditions” till the vigilance approval was secured. Meaning, his close relative was appointed before getting vigilance green signal.