The Kerala Government has issued a notification handing over the probe into the brutal murder of RSS leader Manoj of Kathiroor, Kannur on September 1 to the CBI even as the CPI(M) launched a bid to overcome the sting of the charge of its direct involvement in the killing by accusing the BJP of trying to break the peace prevailing in Kannur.
The State Home Department has sent the notification for the CBI probe into the Manoj murder to the Union Department of Personnel under which the CBI functions. This will now be handed over to the CBI and the agency will then decide whether to take up the case or not after examining the details.
The Kerala Government had decided to hand over the probe into the incident to the CBI on September 6 as per the State DGP’s recommendation, following the pressures exerted by the BJP and RSS and after the sister of the slain RSS leader demanded such a probe. Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh had aired positive opinion about the demand for a CBI probe.
Manoj (42), Kannur district Sharirik Shikshan Pramukh of the RSS, was hacked to death by a Marxist killer gang at Kathiroor near Thalassery in Kannur on September 1. Manoj’s friend Pramod (50) had suffered serious injuries in the attack. The killers had attacked them after creating a terror scene by hurling country bombs at the vehicle in which they were travelling.
Eight CPI(M) workers were named as accused in the FIR of the local police, and currently the murder is being probed by a special investigation team of the Crime Branch of the Kerala Police. First accused Venattintavide Vikraman had surrendered before a Kannur court on Thursday and there were reports that he had admitted that he had committed the crime.
There was also a demand to hand over the probe to the NIA. That the police had charged the accused under the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act had enhanced the possibility of the NIA taking over the probe but legal experts say that this possibility may diminish if the SIT concludes that the case was one of political murder as reports already indicate.
Meanwhile, the CPI(M) on Saturday launched a public relations effort to overcome the sting of the allegation of its direct involvement in the murder by accusing State BJP president V Muraleedharan of exhorting his partymen to perpetrate violence. The CPI(M) move followed a statement Muraleedharan made at a public meet of the BJP in Thalassery on Friday evening.
“Peace is prevailing in Kannur even after the murder of Manoj because we are keeping self-restraint. But don’t think that this is because we are weak. We need only an instruction which could be issued in a moment to get our justice. Don’t force us into that situation,” Muraleedharan said at the party’s Janasakthi Sangamam at Thalassery.
CPI(M)’s Kannur district secretary P Jayarajan, whom the BJP and RSS term as the chief architect of political violence in the district, said the BJP leader’s statement was an open call to start violence. “It means that they (the BJP) used to issue such instructions and that they have their machinery always ready to execute their plans at such instructions,” he alleged.
The BJP leadership defended Muraleedharan saying that his statement had no tone of threat. “Action and retaliation have always been part of the politics in Kannur. Muraleedharan had made no provocative statement,” said State BJP vice-president MT Ramesh.