New Delhi: The recent naming of Kerala Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan’s daughter, T Veena, in a chargesheet filed by the Serious Fraud Investigation Office (SFIO) in an ‘illegal payment’ scandal is politically motivated, said Kerala Law Minister P Rajeev on Thursday.
The SFIO named Veena as an accused in the Cochin Minerals and Rutile Ltd (CMRL) financial fraud case. Reports have suggested that the Ministry of Corporate Affairs have sanctioned the prosecution against Veena Vijayan and those linked in the case of fraudulent activity, wherein they allegedly made Rs 2.70 crore from a private mining company without providing any services.
The SFIO investigation found INR 182 crore financial fraud from the mining company. The fraud, as mentioned in the report, was carried out by the creation of fake bills and inflated inadequate expense.
Following Veena’s name in the chargesheet, the opposition parties, Congress and BJP in Kerala, asked for the resignation of CM Pinarayi Vijayan. Rajeev said that the judicial hearings, including one in the Kerala High Court, said there was no evidence of corruption in context of the alleged financial transactions between CMRL and Exalogic Solutions, the now-defunct IT firm of Veena.
“So, the judicial system and the public have given a clean chit to the state government and the CM in the matter. Therefore, obviously, what has happened is politically motivated against the party and the government,” Rajeev told reporters in Madurai, Tamil Nadu.
As per a report by the Bar and Bench, Exalogic failed to deliver services to CMRL after receiving amount of INR 2.70 crore for IT and marketing requirements. Apart from Veena, CMRL Managing Director Sasidharan, the firm CMRL itself and its sister company.
The development comes a week after the Kerala High Court dismissed a plea from Congress MLA Matthew Kuzhalnadan, who sought a probe into the matter against Vijayan for the alleged financial fraud transactions.
