In under six months in office, the V. D. Satheesan government in Kerala has ordered investigations into 16 major cases, 12 of which directly concern the previous Left Democratic Front (LDF) government and the CPI-M, IANS reported from Thiruvananthapuram on Monday. Individual probes in this wave have been reported as they were ordered; Monday's tally is the first full count of the drive, and the government has indicated that more cases could come under the scanner in the coming days.
Source: IANS
The most prominent of the investigations is the Vigilance probe into the financial transactions of the Kerala Infrastructure Investment Fund Board (KIIFB), the flagship infrastructure-financing body of the previous LDF government. A special police team is separately examining alleged financial irregularities connected with the proposed visit of Lionel Messi's Argentina football team to Kerala.
Source: Nation Press
The Crime Branch is probing alleged irregularities in Public Service Commission (PSC) examinations and appointments, including recruitment to senior posts. A special investigation team is looking into allegations of attacks on Youth Congress and KSU protesters in front of the Secretariat. The other probes include alleged financial irregularities involving former Kannur district panchayat president P. P. Divya, alleged irregularities in the Chevayur Service Cooperative Bank election, the Vadakara 'Kafir' screenshot controversy, and a case relating to protests during a flight carrying the former chief minister. All of these remain allegations under investigation.
The politically most charged file is the Vigilance investigation into the CMRL-Exalogic financial dealings, involving former chief minister Pinarayi Vijayan and others. That probe is temporarily stalled after the Kerala High Court stayed further proceedings.
The government says the investigations were initiated after legal scrutiny and the necessary procedures. The scale of the drive has drawn comparisons with May 2016, when Pinarayi Vijayan took office after defeating the Congress-led UDF government of Oommen Chandy and his government scrutinised Cabinet decisions taken by the Chandy administration between January 1, 2016 and the announcement of the Assembly elections that March. That scrutiny did not establish any wrongdoing. Satheesan himself, along with senior Congress leader V. M. Sudheeran, had sharply questioned several of those Chandy-era decisions at the time — a decade on, he is in the chief minister's chair with his predecessor's decisions under review.
What happens next will depend substantially on the courts: the High Court's stay in the CMRL-Exalogic matter, and any legal challenges to the other probes, will shape how far the investigative drive can go.