The Kerala High Court on Tuesday stayed the trial in the case pertaining to the murder of young Muslim league activist Abdul Shukoor of Ariyil, Kannur in February last year in which CPI(M)’s Kannur district secretary P Jayarajan and Marxist legislator TV Rajesh were 32nd and 33rd accused respectively.
Justice VK Mohanan of the High Court stayed the trial in the case on the basis of a petition filed by Jayarajan and Rajesh seeking quashing of the FIR registered against them.
The court’s interim order has come when the trial in the Shukoor murder case is scheduled to start at the Sessions Court in Thalassery, Kannur in November.
In the petition, the two CPI(M) leaders had pointed out that the charges leveled against them were not legally maintainable and that these were framed without the support of evidences. The court also admitted a plea filed by Shukoor’s mother praying for permission to implead in the case.
According to the chargesheet filed by a special investigation team of the Kerala Police in August last year at Kannur’s First Class Judicial Magistrate Court, Shukoor (21) was murdered by a Marxist killer gang on February 20, 2012 as an act of revenge for an attack on the car in which Jayarajan and Rajesh were travelling.
Jayarajan and Rajesh were charged under Section 118 of the IPC for concealing the plan to murder Shukoor even after coming to know of it. According to the Prosecution, Jayarajan and Rajesh could have known of the conspiracy to kill Shukoor hatched by other CPI(M) men when they were under treatment at a hospital.