THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: Terming the deposition purportedly made by gold smuggling case accused Swapna Suresh to the Enforcement Directorate as factually wrong and absurd, Speaker P Sreeramakrishnan denied having ever met the ruler of Sharjah alone or making plans to invest in an educational institution abroad.
According to the deposition, the Speaker had planned to set up a branch of the Oman-based Middle East College — in which he allegedly has stakes — in Sharjah. The deposition also claimed he had requested the ruler to provide land free of cost to construct the college building. Calling the report a politically-motivated and devious attempt to attack him ahead of the assembly polls, the Speaker said he had neither attempted to open an educational institution abroad nor attempted to find funds for the same.
“What has been reported as the accused’s deposition is totally absurd. Central agencies have been frequently releasing such baseless information with ulterior political motives. All these claims are baseless. Anyone can verify this,” he said.“It is true that I am acquainted with Lafeer Ahammad who runs an educational institution in Oman. As the state’s Speaker, I meet and interact with many NRKs. But misinterpreting such meet to allege that I have invested in all their endeavours smacks of stupidity,” he said.