THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: Former Vigilance director Vinson M Paul has stuck on to his earlier stand in the sensational bar bribery scam involving former finance minister KM Mani, reiterating that he did not try to protect Mani by excluding him in the investigation when he was at the helm of Vigilance. He was responding to fresh allegations against him for deliberately excluding Mani from the chargesheet in the bar bribery case.
After stepping down from the post of chief information officer (CIC) on Saturday, Vinson Paul told reporters that Vigilance could not find any evidence against Mani in the bribery allegations and hence he was given a clean chit.
“I didn’t try to protect him or exclude him from the chargesheet. It is a fact that there was little evidence against Mani. The controversy is politically motivated”, he said.