E-Paper
Kerala gold smuggling case: ED summons Swapna over new allegations
The Enforcement Directorate (ED) on Tuesday summoned the main accused in the Kerala gold smuggling case, Swapna Suresh, following interviews she gave recently raising allegations against IAS officer M Sivasankar -- another accused
Prefer HTon Google
The Enforcement Directorate (ED) on Tuesday summoned the main accused in the Kerala gold smuggling case, Swapna Suresh, following interviews she gave recently raising allegations against IAS officer M Sivasankar -- another accused.
According to officials, Swapna was asked to appear at the ED office in Kochi at 11 am on Wednesday. Suresh later told reporters she would appear before the agency on February 15 since she was undergoing treatment.
Two days ago, excerpts from Sivasankar’s autobiography, ‘Aswathamavu: Verum Oru Aana (Aswarthamavu is only an elephant)’, surfaced in the media, after which Suresh spoke out.
“Since he made serious allegations against me and took a holier- than- thou position, I am forced to come out. I reiterate he exploited and betrayed me and pretends as if he doesn’t know anything,” she said in Thiruvananthapuram on Tuesday. “Whatever I know, he also knows. He can’t take a clean chit like this,” she added.
After the gold smuggling racket came to light in 2020, Sivasankar was among those accused in connection with the case and was suspended from duty.
He was arrested on November 24, 2020, by the customs department for allegedly helping the accused and later, the ED also took his custody. He was granted bail by the chief judicial magistrate dealing with economic offences in Kochi on February 3, 2021. He’s an accused in both customs and ED cases and the ED had slapped money-laundering charges against him. Under suspension for more than 18 months, Sivasankar was reinstated into service last month.
Suresh was arrested in July 2020, shortly after the racket came to light, and after spending 16 months behind bars, was released from jail in November last year.
A senior official of the ED who did not want to be named, said after taking Suresh’s statement and ascertaining other information, the agency will move the trial court to cancel Sivasankar’s bail.
Reacting to the senior bureaucrat’s assertions, Suresh had said in her interviews that Sivasankar was “aware of her all activities and helped her in many ways, including getting out of the state after the seizure of gold.”
She had also alleged that she came in contact with Sivasankar in 2017 and over the period “he was part of her life and all her activities”. She added that two audio clips of her in which she was forced by central agencies to name the chief minister, were also recorded at the behest of Sivasankar. She also said central agencies never forced her to take Vijayan’s name, and that it was a plot stage-managed by Sivasankar.
She also admitted that ₹2 crore cash and two kg gold seized by the ED from her locker during the investigation was part of the commission she got for helping the Life Mission, a project to build free dwelling units for the homeless with the help of Middle East based charity organisation Red Crescent. She also alleged that Sivasankar advised her to keep the money in a locker and asked her to open a joint account with his chartered accountant.
After her disclosure, the opposition Congress and Bharatiya Janata Party hit out at the government, saying their graft charges against Life Mission and other projects were proven right. But senior CPI(M) leader Anathalavattom Anandan said “it was not proper to treat words of the main accused in smuggling case as gospel truth.”
After her interview, police have also started an investigation into her degree certificate. During the investigation in the gold smuggling case, it was found that her degree certificate was fake. Later, the Baba Saheb University in Mumbai had made it clear that there was no B Com course in the varsity and her degree was fake. Though police registered a case in the degree case in 2020, there was no progress in the last two years.
The sensational gold smuggling case came to light on July 5, 2020, when the customs department seized 30kg gold hidden in bathroom fittings in one of the consignments, camouflaged as diplomatic baggage came to UAE consulate in the state capital.
A former employee of the consulate, P Sarith, who came to receive the consignment, was arrested the same day. After a week, the National Investigation Agency arrested Suresh and her accomplice Sandeep Nair from Bengaluru and Sivasankar was arrested after six months. Under suspension for a year and a half, he was taken back in service last month.
