KOCHI: Venugopal Iyer, a chartered accountant and close aide of retired IAS officer M Sivasankar, appeared before the Enforcement Directorate (ED) for questioning in connection with the Wadakkanchery LIFE Mission corruption case.
The ED had summoned Venugopal, who had assisted gold smuggling accused Swapna Suresh in opening a bank locker. Venugopal and Sivasankar will be interrogated simultaneously with regards to the opening of the locker to handle alleged kickbacks.
In the remand report it submitted the Special Court for PMLA, the ED said it had questioned Sivasankar about the locker, but Sivasankar wilfully adopted non-cooperation by giving misleading and evasive replies or evading the query entirely. Earlier, ED had recovered `1 crore in cash from a locker opened in Swapna’s name.
Arrest politically motivated: Kanam
Kannur: The arrest of M Sivasankar by ED is politically motivated, said CPI state secretary Kanam Rajendran. Speaking to reporters in Kannur on Thursday, he said that when the elections are round the corner, Central agencies including ED would fly around the secretariat. “This arrest is part of a political drama. Sivasankar is only an accused in the LIFE Mission case,” he said.