The CM Is Sunburnt

An SMS joke described the recent hartal called by the Left Democratic Front (LDF) as Kerala’s “first solar-powered hartal”. The protest was against chief minister Oommen Chandy’s continuance in office without a judicial inquiry into his alleged links to a fraudster couple. Saritha S. Nair and her paramour Biju Rad­hakrishnan had cheated investors of crores by promising fabulous returns in shares of solar and wind power companies. Investigators had found the couple were in touch with Chandy’s gunman and personal assistant. The CPI(M)-led LDF has drawn up a calendar of demonstrations seeking Chandy’s resignation. What has provoked the storm in the streets is a new allegation: that Chandy had actively commended investment in the couple’s fraudulent scheme.

The opposition now believes it has the ammo needed to dislodge the chief minister. R. Sreedharan Nair, a quarry owner who had filed a cheating complaint against the couple, has said in a petition to a magistrate’s court in Path­anamthitta that Saritha induced him to visit the CM’s office on July 9, 2012. He later told a news channel Chandy’s com­mendation gave him the confidence to advance Saritha Rs 40 lakh for installing a 3 MW solar plant at his company in Palakkad. Strangely, there was no mention of this incident in his earlier complaint: it merely said the couple cheated him of Rs 40 lakh. The discrepancy doesn’t bother the opposition.

“The campaigns and satyagrahas will continue in front of the Secretariat and the district collectorates,” says Vaikom Viswan, convenor of the LDF. “From July 26, we plan a non-stop day-and-night strike. We are not looking for a change in government; we are looking for a change in leadership.” Before the protests spilled into the streets, the opposition had stalled proceedings in the assembly: the post-budget session had to be adjourned to July 18.

Investigators have found that Saritha and Radhakrishnan used Chandy’s name and forged letters bearing his name to lure investors. Saritha was found to have made numerous calls to Chandy’s personal assistant and his gunman. The couple is in jail awaiting trial. Chandy’s personal assistant, Tenny Joppan, and Shalu Menon, a danseuse, have also been held. Connecting these findings to the quarry owner’s remembered meeting with the CM, the opposition believes it has Chandy nailed.

Defending himself, Chandy said in the assembly that Sreedharan Nair had changed his petition numerous times; he said he would not succumb to a pol­itical conspiracy. Says G.M. Idicula, Joppan’s counsel, “In Sreedharan Nair’s original petition against Saritha and her paramour, there is no mention of Joppan or the CM. Then an insertion—‘the chief minister also’­—was added on the second page, without the complainant’s signature. This was an afterthought so that the chief minister could be questioned at a later stage, if needed.” Another finding in Chandy’s defence is that Sreedharan had advanced Rs 25 lakh to Saritha on June 30, 2012—even before he purportedly met Chandy.

For now, the parties and factions in the ruling United Democratic Front (UDF) are putting up a show of support for the CM. But the infighting between the groups and subgroups is no secret. The CPI(M) has been using this to stir dissent in the UDF. CPI(M) leader Kodiyeri Balakrishnan has declared that his party was fine with having finance minister K.M. Mani, of the Kerala Congress (Mani), as Chandy’s replacement. Reacting carefully to that mischievous line, P.C. George of the Kerala Congress (M), the government’s chief whip, says, “We are pained by what is happening. On a leadership change, we leave it to the Congress and its high command. But Mani also has the qualities of a good leader.” The heat is bound to make Chandy sweat. He surely won’t be pra­ying for any solar-powered relief.