Indian Union Muslim League lawmaker and former Kerala public works minister V.K. Ibrahim Kunju was arrested in Kochi on Wednesday over his alleged involvement in a multi-crore corruption case related to the construction of a flyover.
A team from the state Vigilance and Anti-Corruption Bureau recorded the arrest after seeking medical opinion since Kunju, 68, had got himself admitted to a private hospital for an ailment he was already under treatment for.
The vigilance department had earlier questioned him several times during the investigation into the alleged corruption in the construction of a flyover at Palarivattom in Kochi city.
Built at a cost of Rs 42 crore during the previous United Democratic Front government headed by the Congress’s Oommen Chandy, the flyover was inaugurated in 2016 but soon developed holes and cracks leading to its closure in May 2019.
Based on expert opinion, the Left Democratic Front government started demolishing faulty sections of the flyover in September 2019. It will be eventually re-constructed.
Kunju was listed as the fifth accused in the case in which four others, including an IAS officer, have already been arrested.
Sumeet Goyal, managing director of the construction company RDS Projects Ltd; M.T. Thankachan, then assistant manager of the Roads and Bridges Development Corporation of Kerala; Benny Paul, joint general manager of the consultancy KITCO Ltd, and then public works department secretary T.O. Sooraj were arrested last year. They are all out on bail.
The vigilance bureau would take Kunju into custody once they secure medical clearance from the doctors treating him.
The flyover project was marred by a series of corrupt practices allegedly involving the then minister and others including the PWD secretary.
The vigilance probe had found that Goyal was allowed a “mobilisation advance” (working capital) of Rs 8.25 crore, that too interest free, on the direction of Kunju although such a provision was not announced in the tender. The then minister and the officials concerned signed the file allowing the advance in just a day after the contractor applied for the fund.
Kunju was already facing investigation in a money-laundering case filed by the Enforcement Directorate that was probing if he had used a party mouthpiece to launder Rs 10 crore of ill-gotten wealth. It is being probed whether the amount was partly or fully kickbacks from the flyover project.
Kunju is the second IUML lawmaker to be arrested this month after M.C. Kamaruddin was taken into custody for allegedly swindling more than 800 depositors out of over Rs 150 crore in a gold investment scheme run by his now-defunct firm.
Kamaruddin had allegedly run the investment scheme without the requisite permissions and most of the aggrieved investors belonged to his party.
The IUML has found itself in a spot over its lawmakers getting embroiled in corruption cases and scams ahead of the local body polls in December.
Another IUML lawmaker, K.M. Shaji, has been booked in a bribery case involving the illegal construction of a palatial house beyond his known sources of income. The vigilance bureau and the ED are separately probing the case.
The leader of the Opposition, the Congress’s Ramesh Chennithala, accused the government of misusing law-enforcement agencies to target political rivals. The Congress and the IUML are allies.
“The people of Kerala should understand this political vendetta using law-enforcement agencies. The chief minister is directly intervening in these cases by putting pressure on officials to act against political rivals,” said Chennithala.
“What wrong did Ibrahim Kunju do? Was it the first instance of granting a mobilisation advance? He had only put his signature on that document granting mobilisation advance,” the Congress leader said.
