Keralites could still be remembering that distant morning of July 21, 2013 when Chief Minister Oommen Chandy was seen running like a ‘fugitive’ in his own State and from own people by taking a circuitous route to reach his home from the Thiruvananthapuram airport. That was what the infamous solar scam involving con women and fraudsters had done to him.
Now, another serious corruption scandal, the bar bribery scam, which has already forced Finance and law Minister KM Mani to resign, has turned Kerala’s Congress-led ruling UDF into a virtual den of ‘fugitives’, who are afraid of public appearances for fear of angry responses.
The first ‘fugitive’ produced by the bar bribery case indeed was Mani, chairman of the Kerala Congress (M), third biggest partner of the UDF, and the only formally accused person, though after his forced resignation as Minister on Tuesday, he has been putting up a bold face saying openly that such turns of events do not move him.
Mani has not been very enthusiastic about participating in public functions ever since the bar bribery scam erupted on October 31, 2014 trapping him in an unenviable situation but this loathing for public functions reached its zenith on October 29 last when a court order for further probe into the scam made his position absolutely untenable.
The court order came just three days before the start of the two-phase civic elections in the State forcing Mani to stay away from campaigning for his near and dear ones in the KC(M) and UDF even in his own home district, Kottayam. He was also
forced to cancel all his programmes during those days in Idukki district, the second biggest stronghold of his party in the State.
Mani had gone into virtual hiding for several hours on Monday afternoon after the Kerala High Court effectively advised him to decide on
quitting over the bribery charge as per his conscience. It took a lot of searching from the part of the Kerala media to track him down to his daughter’s villa at Tripunithura near Kochi that evening.
Mani not the only leader facing bribery charge -- is accused of demanding Rs5 crore as bribe and taking Rs1 crore of it from the State’s bar owners in early 2014 for helping them to get the licences renewed for their bars closed for lack of required facilities. The State Vigilance had found circumstantial and other evidences to establish that he could have taken bribe.
The latest leader to turn into a virtual fugitive after being accused of accepting bribe from bar owners is Congress’s Excise Minister K Babu, close confidant and staunch loyalist of Chief Minister Oommen Chandy. Babu is accused of taking `10 crore as bribe and
whistleblower Biju Ramesh, a bar owner, has said that he himself had paid Rs50-lakh bribe to the Minister.
On Friday, Babu was to attend a passing-out parade at the Excise Academy in Thrissur but he was forced to cancel his programme following information from the State police’s Special Branch on the possibility of intense protests from the Yuva Morcha and the DYFI, the CPI(M)’s youth outfit. However, no explanation was offered by the Minister’s office for the cancellation.
Sources in the Congress party say that Babu has not been very keen about attending Government or party programmes in his home district Ernakulam and even in his constituency, Tripunithura. The charge against Babu was so damaging that in his ward in Tripunithura Municipality, the UDF candidate was pushed to the third place in the local bodies election held last week.
Another Minister of the Congress accused of taking bribe from the bar owners is said to have started avoiding taking invitations to public programmes of the party and the Government. Editors of Malayalam TV channels also report that leaders of Congress and its UDF allies are extremely unwilling to appear for debates on issues related to the bar bribery scandal.