Thiruvananthapuram: Nirmalan K. alias Nirmal Krishna, the key accused in the Nirmal Krishna finance scam, surrendered before a special court in Madurai on Wednesday afternoon. The court remanded him to judicial custody.
The Tamil Nadu police’s economic offence wing probing the case will be filing a custody application for him in a day or two.
The 54-year-old was absconding over the last two months after his firms, Nirmal Krishna Chit Fund and Nirmal Krishna Nidhi Limited, situated on the Kerala – Tamil Nadu border near Parassala, were shut and he filed an insolvency petition at a local court here. Hundreds of investors were protesting in front of the firm since then, while one of them, Venugopalan Nair of Udiyankulangara who invested Rs 5 lakh, committed suicide. According to police sources, he surrendered following pressure tactics by the Kerala police team assisting the Tamil Nadu police in the probe. “Nirmalan’s brother-in-law Mahesh was arrested on Tuesday on charges of conspiracy and providing hideout. Some of his close associates and close relatives, including his daughter studying at a private medical college in Thiruvananthapuram, were quizzed and kept under close surveillance,” a source said.
They were anticipating his surrender by Wednesday as mobile phones of four of his close aides, including an employee at Thiruvananthapuram airport, remained switched off for the last few days and some of them went on leave till Wednesday. The cops are exploring the scope of arraigning them too.
A crime branch team led by IG S. Sreejith and SP Prashanthan have been assisting the TN police team in the probe. Five other accused in the case were held earlier. Other key suspects, including Nirmalan's brother Narayanan Nair, were expected to surrender soon, said a source.
So far the police received nearly 5000 complaints of investments to the tune of around Rs 400 crore. But the police strongly suspect that a large number of persons who invested unaccounted amounts had not yet lodged complaints. The police hoped to get details regarding his benami transactions during interrogation. Congress MLA V. S. Sivakumar had earlier denied the allegations of links with Nirmalan. But police sources said that a tourism institute official, Harikrishnan, who was associated with Sivakumar’s office while he was tourism minister in previous UDF government, was found to have nexus with Nirmalan. A close relative of Mr Sivakumar was also suspected to be a partner in one of his businesses in the Gulf.
Apart from the case registered by the TN police’s economic offence wing unit at Ozhuginasery in Nagercoil district, two cases were registered by the Museum police here based on individual petitions. The Parassala police also registered a case of abetment in Mr Nair’s suicide.
