Months ahead of assembly polls in Kerala, the LDF government has decided to recommend a CBI probe into cases against former chief minister Oommen Chandy and five others filed over allegations of sexual exploitation by a prime accused woman in the sensational solar scam.
The opposition Congress on Sunday dubbed the move "politically motivated", saying the CPI(M)-led government could not find anything against the party leaders in the last five years and taken the decision as elections were around the corner, while Chandy asserted he was ready to face any probe.
Union Minister V. Muraleedharan also attacked the government, saying the decision for the Central Bureau of Investigation probe had been taken in view of the polls.
Protesting the government move, Youth Congress workers took out a march to the Secretariat in Thiruvananthapuram and burnt an effigy of Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan.
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However, CPI(M) state secretary in-charge A. Vijayaraghavan, rejecting the charge of political motivation, told reporters that it was only a natural course of action to "ensure justice to the complainant".
After the state government decided to give its consent for the CBI probe, a gazette notification has been issued.
The cases against the six, including Chandy, were registered over the past several years and investigated by the Crime Branch police based on a complaint by the woman accused in the multi-crore solar panel scam during the previous UDF government that she was sexually exploited by them in 2012.
Besides Chandy, who was recently appointed head of 10- member election management panel of the party for the state polls expected in April-May, Congress MPs K.C. Venugopal, Hibi Eden and Adoor Prakash and MLA A.P. Anil Kumar and BJP leader A.P. Abdullakutty are the accused in the six cases.
The case against Abdullakutty had been registered in 2014 when he was a Congress MLA from Kannur. He later joined BJP. The complainant, who had levelled allegations of rape against the Congress leaders, had recently written to Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan, seeking CBI probe as the police probe had limitations.
The woman and her co-accused in the scam had allegedly duped several investors of crores of rupees by offering to set up solar panel units for them.
In a letter to the police commissioner on July 19, 2013, the woman had levelled charges of sexual misconduct and corruption against several Congress and UDF leaders, including Chandy, some of his ministers and two former Union ministers.
