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The solar scam kept Kerala’s politics on the boil on Friday with the Opposition sticking to its demand for Chief Minister Oommen Chandy’s resignation and the ruling UDF rallying around him.
At a news conference in Thiruvananthapuram, CPI(M) State Secretary Pinarayi Vijayan reiterated his party’s demand for a judicial inquiry into the scam, but the probe should be carried out after Chandy resigned. He refused to nominate a party representative to the panel of experts to be constituted by the government to examine the CCTV shoots at the Chief Minister’s office.
The Opposition had demanded that the CCTV back files be investigated as, it claimed, files contained the grabs of the solar scam accused Sarita S. Nair’s alleged visits to the Chief Minister’s office.
State Congress president Ramesh Chennithala, echoing the central leadership’s views, said there was no question of a change of guard in the government. He defended the Chief Minister saying that Opposition was raising false allegations against Chandy.
HARTAL COST
In a statement to the media, Oommen Chandy said that the total sum involved in the solar energy scandal was only Rs 10 crore but Wednesday’s Opposition hartal had caused a massive loss of Rs 1,000 crore to the State. He also alleged that the Opposition had launched a personal campaign against him using malicious lies.
In a related development, Industries Minister and Muslim League leader P.K. Kunhalikkutty expressed his party’s deep displeasure at the way things were going on in the Congress and the UDF. The Muslim League, the second largest party in the Congress-led UDF, has been cross with the Congress following “insulting remarks” against the party by certain senior Congress leaders, including KPCC-I president Chennithala.
Kunhalikkutty indicated, in a TV interview, that the League would even think of parting ways with the Congress. “Sharing power is not our ultimate aim,” he remarked.
Meanwhile, the film and TV actor Shalu Menon, who had been arrested for cheating an industrialist of Rs 75 lakh along with other accused in the solar energy racketeering, was denied bail by the Judicial First Class Magistrate, Thiruvananthapuram, on Friday.
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