KOZHIKODE : The very mention of ‘Kakkayam’ will evoke creepy memories of the dark days of the Emergency and the stories of police repression. The name that is etched in Kerala’s political history, is closely connected with the police camp here on the lap of the hills.
It was here that those arrested for resisting the government were brought for interrogation. The notorious Kakkayam Police Outpost, which witnessed the cries of hapless souls in the wilderness of the hill top during the emergency days, will no longer remain for the horrible unknowns of the dark days. The Kerala State Electricity Board (KSEB) has demolished the decades old building for construction canal for the proposed Kakkayam mini-hydro project.
It was after the attack of Kayanna police station that the state home ministry opened a police outpost at Kakkayam in 1964. Several persons including students and youths had been brought to the station in the name of interrogation.
Among them was Rajan Warrior, a student of Regional Engineering College, Kozhikode, who was brought to the camp, but never to return home and become an endless mystery. With the brutal killing of Rajan, allegedly using the ‘third degree’, the camp had earned the label of the most notorious police station in the state, and, the Rajan case led to political changes in the state. Veteran leader K Karunakaran who was the state home minister at the time, was forced to quit his post, taking the responsibility for the incident. After that, the state government had ordered to close down the camp.
Since then, the building, which had two ‘lockup’ rooms, two offices and a hall, have been laying closed for the past three decades. The police opened yet another outpost at Kakkayam.
It was in 1964 that the KSEB built the building mainly for storing instruments and equipment. KSEB assistant executive engineer(Kakkayam hydro project) Abdul Rehman said that the building was given to the Police Department for camp operations which later came to be known as Kakkayam camp and the decades old building has been laying defunct for many years.