The Principal Sessions Court, Ernakulam, on Wednesday extended the remand of the accused in the diplomatic gold smuggling case till October 7. The petition seeking extension of remand was filed by the Enforcement Directorate (ED).
The remand extension report, the first such document to be filed by the agency after the interrogation of Higher Education Minister K.T. Jaleel and Bineesh Kodiyeri, the son of CPI(M) State secretary Kodiyeri Balakrishnan, was silent on the interrogation of the two high profile individuals.
Interestingly, the remand extension report filed by the ED at the Principal Sessions Court, Ernakulam, on the day in which it interrogated Mr. Bineesh, had mentioned that it was interrogating a high profile individual.
In the report filed on Wednesday, the agency repeated the arguments that Swapna Suresh, one of the accused in the case, had close ties with M. Sivasankar, the secretary to the Chief Minister. This has led to a situation where Mr. Sivasankar had to be interrogated again, it submitted.
Mr. Sivasankar was fully aware of the dubious integrity of the accused. It was also revealed that Swapna had meetings with Mr. Sivasankar when the State machinery was in the UAE from October 17-21, 2018, seeing assistance for flood relief. All these revelations required more questioning of Swapna and the other accused in the custody, it submitted.
The investigation revealed that the accused had connections with high profile individuals and the probe on the aspect was progressing. The involvement of other people in the crime as well as the end users and the beneficiaries needed to be ascertained, it submitted.