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HC rejects VS plea for probe report’s copy
Kerala Opposition leader VS Achuthanandan on Wednesday suffered a setback in his legal battle against Industries Minister PK Kunhalikutty over the infamous ice cream parlour sex abuse case with the High Court dismissing his petition seeking copy of the report of the follow-up probe carried out by a special team of the Kerala Police into the scandal.
A division bench of the High Court including Acting Chief Justice Manjula Chellur rejected Achuthanandan’s plea saying that the probe report was not a court document and that the court rules did not allow providing a copy of such an item to him. However, the court said that he could approach the magistrate court with the request when it reached there.
While seeking copies of the investigation report and the associated documents concerned with the ice cream parlour sex scandal, Achuthanandan had complained that the UDF Government, in which Muslim League heavyweight Kunhalikutty was an influential Minister, was trying to scuttle the follow-up probe, ordered in February, 2011 when VS was chief minister.
Dismissing Achuthanandan’s petition, the High Court said that it did not believe the probe was being derailed as it was carried out under direct Judicial supervision. However, another plea from Achuthanandan, seeking a CBI investigation into the scandal, was still under the High court’s consideration.
Earlier, the Government had opposed in the court Achuthanandan’s request for a copy of the follow-up investigation report saying he was neither a complainant nor a witness in the ice cream parlour sex abuse case. The former LDF government had instituted the Crime Branch probe on the basis of a “revelation” that Kunhalikutty had tried to derail the earlier probe.
The case pertains to the alleged sexual abuse of minor girls based at an ice cream parlour in Kozhikode. The allegation against Kunhalikutty was that he had sexually abused Rejina, a minor girl then, at three different locations in 1996. Kunhalikutty was forced to resign as minister in 2004 after Rejina herself “divulged” this through television channels.
The former Achuthanandan regime launched a re-probe into the scandal early last year following the revelations by businessman KA Rauf, also a close relative and former close aide of Kunhalikutty, that the Minister had derailed the probe into the scandal by threatening the victims and witnesses and bribing two former judges of the Kerala High Court.
Rauf had on January 28, 2011 held a Press conference in Kozhikode to accuse the Muslim League leader of paying lakhs of rupees to the victims of the sex scandal and threatening them to change the statements they had earlier given to the police and the court about his involvement in the sex racket.
The businessman had claimed that Kunhalikutty had given Rs 4 million as bribe to former High Court judges KT Thankappan and K Narayana Kurup in order to earn favourable verdicts. Rauf had said that he himself had arranged for the payments of these bribes for Kunhalikutty in most cases, adding that he was ready to face the consequences of his disclosures.
Kerala Opposition leader VS Achuthanandan on Wednesday suffered a setback in his legal battle against Industries Minister PK Kunhalikutty over the infamous ice cream parlour sex abuse case with the High Court dismissing his petition seeking copy of the report of the follow-up probe carried out by a special team of the Kerala Police into the scandal.
A division bench of the High Court including Acting Chief Justice Manjula Chellur rejected Achuthanandan’s plea saying that the probe report was not a court document and that the court rules did not allow providing a copy of such an item to him. However, the court said that he could approach the magistrate court with the request when it reached there.
While seeking copies of the investigation report and the associated documents concerned with the ice cream parlour sex scandal, Achuthanandan had complained that the UDF Government, in which Muslim League heavyweight Kunhalikutty was an influential Minister, was trying to scuttle the follow-up probe, ordered in February, 2011 when VS was chief minister.
Dismissing Achuthanandan’s petition, the High Court said that it did not believe the probe was being derailed as it was carried out under direct Judicial supervision. However, another plea from Achuthanandan, seeking a CBI investigation into the scandal, was still under the High court’s consideration.
Earlier, the Government had opposed in the court Achuthanandan’s request for a copy of the follow-up investigation report saying he was neither a complainant nor a witness in the ice cream parlour sex abuse case. The former LDF government had instituted the Crime Branch probe on the basis of a “revelation” that Kunhalikutty had tried to derail the earlier probe.
The case pertains to the alleged sexual abuse of minor girls based at an ice cream parlour in Kozhikode. The allegation against Kunhalikutty was that he had sexually abused Rejina, a minor girl then, at three different locations in 1996. Kunhalikutty was forced to resign as minister in 2004 after Rejina herself “divulged” this through television channels.
The former Achuthanandan regime launched a re-probe into the scandal early last year following the revelations by businessman KA Rauf, also a close relative and former close aide of Kunhalikutty, that the Minister had derailed the probe into the scandal by threatening the victims and witnesses and bribing two former judges of the Kerala High Court.
Rauf had on January 28, 2011 held a Press conference in Kozhikode to accuse the Muslim League leader of paying lakhs of rupees to the victims of the sex scandal and threatening them to change the statements they had earlier given to the police and the court about his involvement in the sex racket.
The businessman had claimed that Kunhalikutty had given Rs 4 million as bribe to former High Court judges KT Thankappan and K Narayana Kurup in order to earn favourable verdicts. Rauf had said that he himself had arranged for the payments of these bribes for Kunhalikutty in most cases, adding that he was ready to face the consequences of his disclosures.
