THIRUVANANTHPURAM: CPM leader V.S. Achuthanandan said on Saturday that former Vigilance director N. Shankar Reddy should be suspended from his post of state Crime Records Bureau chief in the wake of the Vigilance Court ordering further investigation into the bar bribe case against former finance minister K.M. Mani. In a statement here, Mr Achuthanandan said this was the first time in the history of corruption cases that a Vigilance director himself had intervened to sabotage the case.
“Such interference would only lead to complete chaos. Reddy continuing as chief of state Crime Records Bureau is dangerous. He should be taken into custody and questioned to reach the bottom of the truth in the bar bribe case,” he added.
Mr Achuthanandan said he had expressed apprehensions regarding attempts being made to sabotage the probe right in the beginning. “K.M. Mani was the uncrowned king of the corrupt UDF government. Hence, the case against him could not have been sabotaged by a Vigilance director alone. There was clear intervention from those in the government to change the direction of the probe,” he alleged.
He said Mr Ramesh Chennithala’s latest statement pointed to that possibility. “The then chief minister Oommen Chandy and the then home minister Chennithala should also be brought within the purview of the probe,” he added. “Now that Mani is being proved to be corrupt, his party Kerala Congress should be thrown out of the state's political sphere. The LDF government can in no way go together with the corrupt,” he added.
