Kerala’s Vigilance and Anti-Corruption Bureau (VACB) had last month given a clean chit to State Finance Minister KM Mani in the infamous bar bribery scam but latest reports suggest that the agency had taken this step despite the existence of a report of its investigating officer which had said that there was strong evidence against the Minister that warranted his prosecution.
The 386-page factual report of Superintendent of Police (Vigilance) R Sukesan, who had headed the team which probed the scam, had said that there was strong circumstantial and scientific evidence which supported the charge that Mani, the senior-most member of Kerala’s Congress-led UDF Cabinet, had taken bribe from the State’s bar owners.
The report filed in the Special Vigilance Court on July 8 by Sukesan himself under the direction from the bureau’s Director, Vinson M Paul, had recommended winding up of the probe against Mani claiming that there was no evidence against him. But it has now become amply clear that Sukesan had submitted the report exonerating Mani most probably under immense pressure.
Sukesan’s report has now come out in the open as it had to be submitted to the court following its July 9 order calling for all the documents associated with the bar bribery scandal. The court had issued this instruction after examining the referral report — which exonerated Mani — the agency had filed the previous day.
The surfacing of Sukesan’s report now is indeed a huge setback for the Congress-led UDF Government, which had from the very initial days of the scam been holding that Mani had done nothing wrong, as this has happened at a time when it has been thinking that the scam has got buried totally.
The bar bribery scam erupted with Biju Ramesh, working president of Kerala Bar Hotels’ Association, alleging on October 31 last that Mani, also the State law Minister, had asked for `5 crore bribe from the bar owners and had taken `1 crore of it promising to help them get the licenses renewed for their bars that were closed down for lack of required facilities.
As per Sukesan’s factual report, there was circumstantial and scientific evidence to show that Mani, chairman of the Kerala Congress (M), third biggest UDF partner, had received `15 lakh from bar owners on March 22, 2014 at his residence in Pala, Kottayam and `10 lakh from them at his official residence in Thiruvananthapuram on the morning of April 2, 2014.
The report said that there were contradictions between the statements of Mani and D Rajkumar Unni, president of the bar owners’ association who had allegedly paid `10 lakh to the Minister. When Mani had during questioning by investigators denied having met Unni, the latter had told them that he had indeed met the Minister on the particular day.
According to Biju Ramesh, Unni had taken the money to Mani in his car which was being driven by his driver, Ambili. Sukesan’s report pointed out that the scientific evidence collected by the investigating team had established that Unni’s mobile phone was in the switching area, under which Mani’s official residence fell, on the morning of April 2, 2014.
Besides, the result of the polygraph procedure done on Ambili, who had stated that he had seen Unni handing over the money to Mani, had proved that he could have been telling the truth, the report had said. Sukesan had also mentioned in the report that the refusal of Unni and another bar owner, Sreevalsan, to undergo lie-detection test generated suspicion.
After Sukesan’s report surfaced in the media on Monday, State CPI(M) secretary Kodiyeri Balakrishnan said that it had now become obvious that the Government had tried to sabotage the investigation into the scam while Mani’s party, the KC(M), said the ultimate decision was to come from the court.