Tremendous pressure on Vigilance to prevent arrest of Ebrahim Kunju

He will be arraigned along with the 4 co-accused. Report to be filed before Vigilance court

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KOCHI: The Vigilance and Anti-Corruption Bureau (VACB) will again question former PWD Minister V K Ebrahim Kunju in the Palarivattom flyover scam case. But the probe team is under tremendous pressure not to arrest the IUML leader even though he will be arraigned as an accused.

Official sources told TNIE that the chances of Kunju’s arrest are remote as there is a concerted move within the state government to avoid an arrest that will put him in an embarrassing situation. As per the plan being mooted by the department, the probe team will file a report before the Muvattupuzha Vigilance court arraigning him as an accused along with the other four accused – T O Sooraj, former PWD secretary; Sumit Goyal, managing director of RDS Project Ltd; M T Thankachan, former additional general manager of Roads and Bridges Development Corporation-Kerala (RBDCK); and Benny Paul, joint general manager of Kitco.

While Sooraj, Goyal, Thankachan and Paul were arrested and had to be in jail for over 60 days till they availed bail from Kerala High Court, the Vigilance department is planning an option for Kunju wherein he need not face an arrest and seek bail for release but will have to legally fight the charges against him in the court once the Vigilance lists him as an accused.

“In case of the other accused, the Vigilance arrested them and opposed their bail pleas because the probe was in the initial stage and the accused were powerful to tamper with the evidence. As of now, Kunju is cooperating with the probe and the situation does not warrant an arrest. We are giving him enough time to present his version and he has been claiming that all crucial decisions on Palarivattom flyover were taken by the then PWD secretary,” an official said.

Senior lawyer and former Director General of Prosecutions (DGP) T Asaf Ali said a decision to arrest an accused in a Vigilance case is taken based on the gravity of the offence committed by the particular accused. “The gravity of the crime committed by an accused in a case decides whether an arrest should be made or not,” he added.