Assembly stalled as members trade charges
THIRUVANANTHAPURAM — The communist-led opposition members stalled the Kerala Assembly yesterday demanding ouster of a ruling member even as the police grilled one of its top leaders in a ‘kangaroo trial’ and execution of a rival.
The Left Democratic Front (LDF) members disrupted the proceedings saying would not allow the business to continue while Indian Union Muslim League (IUML) legislator P K Basheer, who allegedly inspired Sunday’s double murder in Malappuram, was sitting on the treasury benches.
In Kannur, the citadel of the Communist Party of IndiaMarxist (CPM), the party’s district secretary P Jayarajan was summoned to the district headquarters of the police to take his statement on the murder of IUML student activist Abdul Shukkoor.
Shukkoor, accused of attacking the vehicle in which Jayarajan and the first-time CPM legislator T V Rajesh were travelling, was detained for two-and-half hours, sent his MMS image for verification and killed him before a crowd of 100 people.
After the interrogation that lasted for more than two hours, District Police Superintendent Rahul Nair said he got some crucial information from Jayarajan, who was asked to appear again on June 22 after Rajesh’s questioning on Saturday.
Jayarajan
cried foul
say- ing his lawyer was not allowed in and the police were trying to fix him up as per the script supplied by Chief Minister Oommen Chandy and the IUML. He also criticised the police officer for speaking to media after questioning him.
In the Assembly, the LDF members demanded the arrest of the IUML legislator as he was named in the police report on the murder of Azad and Abubaker at Areekode market, in which their relatives accused Basheer of instigating it. Speaker G Karthikeyan adjourned the House for the day ahead of schedule after rushing through the business amidst bedlam.
Basheer had made an inflammatory speech earlier this month that the IUML would hit back against those who had killed Atiq Rehman, an IUML activist, in January after a clash erupted at a football tournament in Malappuram.
“The home minister and the chief minister are protecting the person who should be arrested after he was named in the police report and is sitting in the House. If it was a legislator from the opposition ranks, you would have set the law in motion and arrested him,” said Deputy Leader of Opposition Balakrishnan, the former home minister.
Home Minister Thiruvanchoor Radhakrishnan countered this saying an impartial inquiry had been initiated and one should wait for it before making any unreasonable demands.
He ruled out the arrest on the basis of a speech, prompting the opposition legislators to boycott the proceedings and shout slogans.
“If we were to take your claims that he should be arrested, can we make this as the rule of the land? If we do that, it would be against all the present rules and laws, and hence we cannot go ahead with it and we will wait for the investigation to be over,” Chief Minister Oommen Chandy said.
Meanwhile, the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) probing the murder of Mohammed Fasal, said in the charge sheet that the CPM tried to incite communal riot by blaming it on the Hindu extremists while Balakrishnan was the home minister.