'No plan to move court against solar scandal inquiry': Oommen Chandy

"Election stunt will invite more embarrassment to the government," Chandy said.

Senior Congress leader and former Kerala chief minister Oommen Chandy on Monday said he has no plan to move the court questioning the decision of the state government to hand over the sexual assault case related to the solar scandal to the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI). He said he was least bothered about the new development.

Former Kerala CM Oommen Chandy. (HT File Photo)

“Let any agency inquire it, I am least worried. Earlier, three police chiefs investigated it and found no substance in wild allegations. The government sat over the case for almost five years and failed to do anything,” he said, adding that the latest move was an election stunt and it will invite more embarrassment to the government.

The case pertains to the alleged sexual abuse of Saritha Nair, the main accused in the solar scam, by many Congress leaders including Chandy, AICC general secretary KC Venugopal, MPs Hibi Eden and Adoor Prakash and former Congress MP AP Abdullakutty who is now the BJP national vice-president. In her complaint to the CM, Nair said she was sexually abused by many leaders in return of favours she received from them and she failed to get justice from the local police. The state government decided to hand over the case to the central agency on Sunday.

“The ruling CPI(M)had tried its best to implicate me in the case. And it registered a fresh case two years ago with non-bailable provisions. Many advised me to take an anticipatory bail but I did not. My conscience is clear and hands are clean,” said the former CM, who was appointed the head of the party election committee recently. He said CM Pinarayi Vijayan has admitted his failure by lobbing the ball into the CBI's court.

“In 2018, the government received a setback in the High Court and it did not go to the Supreme Court fearing further trouble. The latest move is just a face-saver for the CM. I don’t see any other importance to it,” he said, adding that the decision to hand over the case at the fag end of the tenure will only expose the government.

“People of the state will realise the government’s ploy. It happened at a time when the government is opposing the central agency tooth and nail in many cases, including the twin political murders of north Kerala and the Life Mission project.” He said the government desperately wanted to divert the attention from the gold smuggling and other cases so it dusted out an old cheating case in which the government did not lose a single penny.

The solar scandal centred around a fictitious solar energy company called ‘Team Solar’ formed in 2013 by Nair and second husband, Biju Radhakrishnan, who flaunted their contacts with the chief minister’s office and cheated people out of money by seeking investments with the promise of making them business partners or offering to install solar power units. Chandy was then the Kerala CM and had sacked two of his private secretaries and the state public relations director when their names cropped up in the case. The government had also constituted a judicial commission to probe the case.

Interestingly, Nair was sentenced in at least six cases and is out on bail. In the 2019 parliament elections, she attempted to take on Congress leader Rahul Gandhi in Kerala’s Wayanad, but her nomination papers were rejected because of her conviction. Last year, the Supreme Court had dismissed her plea which questioned Gandhi’s election and imposed a fine of ₹10,000 on her. Last month, the police had booked her in another case for allegedly cheating many youth offering government jobs.