When Bengal ‘sneezes’ after ED picks up Partha Chatterjee, has Kerala’s CPI-M caught a ‘cold’?

Thiruvananthapuram:  As the Enforcement Directorate (ED) on Saturday picked up West Bengal minister and Trinamool Congress secretary general Partha Chatterjee in a corruption case, the Kerala unit of the CPI-M appears to have caught a ‘cold’ literally.

Things have not gone well with the Kerala unit of the CPI-M in general and Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan in particular, ever since the prime accused in the gold smuggling case, Swapna Suresh in June made damning allegations and said that Vijayan, his wife and their daughter indulged in smuggling gold and currency.

Following this, the Congress and the BJP have been demanding that Vijayan either answer the questions Swapna has posed, or face a probe, which have both been dismissed by Vijayan. While the entire party is behind him organising a series of rallies and public meetings, the state has been flooded with huge posters giving him a clean chit.

But, things turned sour on Wednesday for CPI-M and Vijayan after the ED approached the Supreme Court seeking a transfer of the gold smuggling cases from Kerala to Bengaluru. On Thursday, the ED informed the court that if allowed, they will file her confession statement in a sealed cover before the court.

Ever since Swapna made the allegations, Vijayan for all practical purposes has completely gone ‘incommunicado’. His only interaction with the media was after June first week, that too through press releases from his office.

Meanwhile, Swapna after hearing the ED filing a petition to transfer the case to Bengaluru has wholeheartedly welcomed it. “For the first time, I feel positive that the case will come to its logical conclusion, as I myself has pointed out, that Vijayan is concerned only about his daughter, while women like me are being made the scapegoat in this case,” she said.

Swapna has already gone on record to state that she will fight till her last breath to prove that all what she said against Vijayan and his family is true.

Now all eyes are on the apex court on whether it will allow the ED to transfer the case from here to Bengaluru or not. In the past, a disproportionate assets case involving former Tamil Nadu chief minister J. Jayalalithaa was transferred from Tamil Nadu to Bengaluru.

–IANS