court in Pathanamthitta, Kerala on Thursday sentenced con woman Saritha S Nair and her business associate and former live-in partner Biju Radhakrishnan to six years’ rigorous imprisonment in a cheating case related to the infamous solar scam which had pushed the State’s Congress-led UDF Government to the verge of collapse in 2013 because of the alleged involvement of Chief Minister Oommen Chandy’s office in it.
The First Class Judicial Magistrate Court in Pathanamthitta awarded the punishment to the fraudsters on Thursday morning just a few minutes after it pronounced them guilty of almost all the charges the Prosecution had slapped on them. This was the first case related to the solar scam in which a court had pronounced its verdict.
The verdict is seen as a success for the Prosecution as it could prove almost all the charges — like cheating, forgery and conspiracy — it had slapped on the two fraudsters. Public Prosecutor Pradeep Kumar said the court was convinced that the culprits had forged documents to perpetrate the fraud. Apart from imprisonment, the court also slapped fines on both Saritha and Biju.
The case pertained to the cheating of EK Baburaj of Idayaranmula, Pathanamthitta, an NRI, of `1.19 crore by Saritha and Biju in November, 2012 promising to install solar power system and to give him a top position in their company, Team Solar Energy Solutions.Though the two were awarded a total of six years’ imprisonment each for the various charges slapped on them, the actual period of imprisonment would be three years as the punishment would run concurrently. Imprisonment for three years was awarded over the charge of cheating.
As per the verdict, Biju, first accused in the case, will have to pay a fine of `75 lakh. The fine slapped on Saritha, second accused, was `45 lakh. The court ordered payment of compensation to Baburaj from the amount to be paid as fine by the convicts. The verdict came at the end of a two-month trial during which 34 witnesses and 77 documents were examined.
The solar scam pertained to the duping of many Keralites of several crores of rupees by the two fraudsters by promising to install solar power plants for which they had used forged documents and misused connections with powerful politicians. A special investigation team of the Kerala Police had registered a total of 33 cases in connection with the solar scam.
The Congress-led Governmetn had come under severe attack following the allegation that Saritha had made the Chief Minister’s office as her operational base with the silent permission of Chandy and active help of some of his former aides. It was also alleged that several top Congress leaders had helped Saritha in her fraudulent business for sexual favours.
The court said that the duo had misused Government systems for perpetrating the fraud. Biju had donated `2 lakh to the Chief Minister’s relief fund and he had used the letter given as receipt for this to convince Baburaj about his connections in the corridors of power.Biju and Saritha were also charged with impersonation as they had approached Baburaj with assumed names of RB Nair and lakshmi Nair respectively. The court granted bail to Saritha for the appeal period of three weeks but Biju would not get it as he was already in jail in the case related to the murder of his wife.
“The verdict is unfortunate but I have no complaint,” Saritha said. “I respect the court’s decision. However, I have been given the opportunity to go for appeal which I will be doing in two-three days,” she said. Biju Radhakrishnan also said he would file an appeal against the trial court’s verdict.Additional DGP A Hemachandran, who headed the special investigation team that had probed the solar scam cases, said he was happy about the verdict. “The ultimate test of any probe is in the court and this case has passed that test,” he said.