THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: A magistrate court in Thiruvananthapuram on Saturday accepted the CBI’s clean chit for former chief minister Oommen Chandy in the sexual abuse case registered against him based on a complaint by the prime accused in the solar scam.
The Chief Judicial Magistrate court action — which comes almost 45 days after Oommen Chandy’s demise — was based on a report submitted by the Thiruvananthapuram unit of the central investigating agency. The report was accepted after the court heard the arguments of the complainant. Noticeably, the court issued the order just three days before the Puthuppally by-election.
The probe agency had found no substantial evidence against Chandy in the case. A plea filed by the complainant challenging the CBI report was also rejected by the court.
It had earlier approved the acquittal of AICC general secretary K C Venugopal and MP Adoor Prakash in the same case due to lack of evidence. BJP national vice-president A P Abdullakutty, another accused, has also been given a clean chit.
Clean chit for all accused in case registered in 2013
With this, the CBI has exonerated all accused in the case registered in 2013. Chandy was not present at Cliff House (the official residence of the CM) on the day the crime was said to have been committed, as alleged by the complainant, the report said. It added that there were discrepancies in the complainant’s statements.
The complainant, who was earlier arraigned in a slew of cheating cases, had levelled rape and sexual harassment complaints against Chandy, Venugopal, Congress legislator A P Anil Kumar, Congress MPs Hibi Eden and Adoor Prakash, and Abdullakutty. Sections pertaining to financial exploitation, corruption and harassment of women were slapped on the accused.
The case was first probed by the crime branch, which registered FIRs against the accused. On February 24, 2021, the state government handed over the case to the CBI.
The crime branch also submitted a report to the state government saying it could not find any evidence to implicate Chandy. The UDF alleged that the transfer of the case to the CBI was politically motivated. The agency also handed over an objection report to New Delhi, recommending that the case not be taken up owing to a lack of evidence, as well as concerns over the brevity of the complaint.