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Business News/ Politics / Policy/  Kerala police report links CPM activists to Kannur murder
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Kerala police report links CPM activists to Kannur murder

The police report indicates that the CPM's claim of innocence in the murder is untrue, damaging the image of the communist government

Congress members protest in front of the state secretariat in Thiruvananthapuram on Tuesday to condemn the killing of Youth Congress worker Shuhaib.Premium
Congress members protest in front of the state secretariat in Thiruvananthapuram on Tuesday to condemn the killing of Youth Congress worker Shuhaib.

Bengaluru: Activists from Kerala’s ruling Communist Party of India (Marxist), or CPM, planned and executed the murder of Shuhaib, the youth Congress worker who was hacked to death on 12 February in Kannur district, says a remand report filed by police on Monday.

The police report, first reported by regional news channels on Tuesday and seen by Mint, indicates that the CPM’s claim of innocence in the murder is untrue, damaging the image of the communist government.

Since it came to power in 2016, the CPM and the Bharatiya Janata Party, along with its ideological parent Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh have been involved in a cycle of violent political attacks against each other in politically sensitive Kannur.

Following allegations against the CPM, chief minister Pinarayi Vijayan last year pledged to end the murderous politics plaguing the region by initiating peace dialogues. Shuhaib’s murder, which has triggered a series of opposition protests, threatens to subvert the call for truce.

The assailants, a gang of four, held a grudge against the victim for intervening in a recent clash between pro-CPM Students Federation of India (SFI) and pro-Congress Kerala Students Union activists in a local school. This resulted in the murder, said the police report. The killers arrived on the crime scene in a hired vehicle and hurled bombs to create panic before attacking Shuhaib with a clear intention to kill, it said.

The police report, however, slightly contradicts DGP (north zone) Rajesh Dewan’s statement before the press in Kannur on Monday. Dewan said the suspects did not intend to kill but only grievously injure Shuhaib.

The report said the two people arrested so far, M.V. Aakash and Rejin Raju, both active workers of the CPM, have confessed to the killing. The investigation team has examined over 100,000 phone calls and used other scientific means to zero in on the accused, the report said.

K. Sudhakaran, an opposition Congress leader from Kannur who was close to Shuhaib, launched a 48-hour fasting protest in Kannur on Tuesday, reiterating his party’s allegation that the CPM is shielding the real killers.

The police have arrested only “dummies provided by the CPM" in order to save the real culprits, he alleged on Monday.

Sudhakaran’s allegations were echoed by Congress leader and former chief minister Oommen Chandy who visited Kannur on Tuesday. He said, as per regional television reports, that the government led by CPM is building pressure on the police to thwart the investigation. Shuhaib’s father Mohammed has told regional television reporters that he has lost faith in the state police and wants a Central Bureau of Investigation probe into the murder.

In a press meet in Kozhikode district, Congress leader Ramesh Chennithala also expressed dissatisfaction with the investigation.

“Shuhaib murder case is investigated under Kannur range IG Mahipal Yadav. But Mahipal joined Kerala service on central deputation. The government should make it clear the reason to appoint an official on deputation to probe the case. I don’t trust the police," he said, according to the online edition of the regional newspaper Mathrubhumi.

The DGP, however, denied charges of political pressure and said that the men arrested on Monday are the actual killers.

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Published: 21 Feb 2018, 01:29 AM IST
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