C M Raveendran, additional private secretary to Kerala chief minister Pinarayi Vijayan, on Monday failed to appear before the Enforcement Directorate (ED) for questioning in connection with the alleged kickbacks in the state government’s Life Mission project, people familiar with the matter said.
They said Raveendran has sent a mail to the central agency saying that he is “busy” with the ongoing assembly session and promised to appear before it once he turns free. Raveendran was seen in the legislative assembly.
A week after the arrest of chief minister’s principal secretary M Sivasankar, who is in judicial custody now, the ED had asked Raveendran to appear in its Kochi office at 10am on Monday.
Two days ago, a popular website in Malayalam carried details of a private chat between Raveendran and main accused in gold smuggling and Life Mission cases, Swapna Suresh. Though the HT could not independently verify authenticity of the chat, it allegedly contained “salacious comments.” The ED had reportedly retrieved the call data and other details from two destroyed mobile phones of Swapna Suresh and Sivasankar.
The case pertains to alleged diversion of funds donated by international aid agency “Red Crescent” to construct a housing complex for flood-affected people at Vadakancherry in Thrissur district in 2019, as part of the Kerala government’s Life Mission project.
It surfaced when central agencies were probing the gold smuggling case in which 30 kg of smuggled gold was seized from the UAE consulate in the state capital Thiruvananthapuram in June 2020.
The ruling Communist Party of India (Marxist) or CPI(M) has distanced itself from the matter.