KASARAGOD: The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) on Thursday dropped a political bomb by naming CPM’s influential leader KV Kunhiraman, 60, an accused in the murder of Youth Congress workers Kripesh and Sarath Lal at Periya.
Though all the 24 persons accused in the case are linked to or leaders of the CPM, Kunhiraman is in a different league. The Congress said it was surprised the CBI did not arrest him despite pressing charges against him.
“He should be immediately arrested else he will use his influence in the party and the government to sabotage the investigation,” said Congress district president PK Faisal.Kunhiraman had twice won as MLA from the Udma constituency, in 2001 and 2006. Today, he is one of the nine members of the CPM’s powerful district secretariat. He is also in line to become the CPM’s district secretary.
The CBI said it did not arrest him because he was not directly involved in the double murder on February 17, 2019. But he along with CPM district committee member and Kanhangad block panchayat president K Manikandan, CPM members Raghavan Velutholy, 51, and KV Bhaskaran, 55, forcefully took away one of the main accused, Saji George, from police custody at Pakkam on the intervening night of February 18 and 19, said CBI DySP TP Ananthakrishnan.
That is why Kunhiraman is charged with IPC Section 225 (rescuing an accused from lawful custody) and Section 120 B (conspiracy to rescue the accused from custody). Lawyer MK Baburaj, a Congress leader and family friend of Sarath Lal’s father Sathyanarayanan, said the sections are non-bailable and Kunhiraman should have been arrested.If convicted, Kunhiraman faces up to seven years in prison because the person he allegedly rescued is accused of a capital offence.
Kunhiraman said the entire charges against him and other leaders are fabricated. “No such incident happened... the accused were handed over to the police around 1.30am (on February 19),” he said. He said the CPM decided not to protect the accused and wanted the police to immediately arrest all the persons involved.