Thiruvananthapuram, June 28 (Ajit Weekly News) Kerala Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan on Tuesday reacted sharply to the fresh revelations levelled against him by Swapna Suresh, the prime accused in the gold smuggling case, in the Assembly.
He accused the opposition BJP and the Congress-led UDF of colluding together to shield Suresh but refused to respond on several queries raised by the UDF on the floor of the house.
After the Question Hour ended, the UDF sought leave for an adjournment motion to discuss the fresh revelations made by Swapna Suresh, and this was allowed to be taken up by the Chief Minister for nearly two hours.
This is only the second time that Vijayan gave the approval to discuss a notice given for the discussion on the gold smuggling case.
In reply to the various allegations levelled by the opposition on the basis of Swapna Suresh’s revelations, Vijayan said it is unfortunate that the opposition is relying on her statements and claiming these to be true.
“She is an accused in a few cases and is the one who changes her statements frequently. She had earlier given a similar statement. How come the Opposition is getting to know the contents of her statement given to a court,” he asked.
“Just look who is shielding her, it’s the Sangh Parivar forces. She has been given a job by one such agency, see who is her counsel. Sadly the Congress-led opposition has joined the Sangh Parivar forces. In the last Assembly, there was one legislator of theirs (Sangh Parivar), this Assembly, there is none and you (Congress) have joined forces with them to attack a government which is working for the uplift of the people,” he said.
Vijayan also asked what happened after four central investigating agencies had probed the matter when the same allegations against him surfaced earlier in 2020.
“If they (probe agencies) had a shred of evidence, then would they have remained silent? So we are not going to be cowed down by all these allegations,” he added and became angry when Congress member Mathew Kuzhalnaden who referred to his daughter Veena and her company.
“Don’t drag those who are sitting at home. You speak political things and not baseless things, especially against those who are sitting at home,” he added.
Kuzhalnaden later told the media that he stands by what he said about Vijayan’s daughter and in a day or two, he will come back with all evidences to buttress his statements about her.
Leader of Opposition V.D. Satheesan slammed Vijayan, pointing out that during the 58 minutes he spoke, he did not reply to a single query and instead accused the Sangh Parivar and the Congress-led UDF and the BJP are colluding to malign him.
“For 25 minutes of his time, he (Vijayan) spoke about the Sangh Parivar forces and about us (Congress). We are demanding that he orders a CBI probe into the matter. He claims that he is not worried, then he should order a CBI probe. We will now take note of his replies and we will decide on what our next step is, as he has not given a single answer,” he said.
State BJP President K.Surendran said Vijayan has run away from answering questions posed to him.
“He chants ‘Sangh Parivar’ like chanting mantras a hundred times and he has become a miserable failure that he does not even care to file a defamation petition against those who he says has defamed him and his government. Mind you, he is also the Home Minister and he says all this is a conspiracy but he is unable to even unravel that,” he said.
–Ajit Weekly News
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