BENGALURU: Bineesh Kodiyeri, son of Kerala CPM secretary Kodiyeri Balakrishnan, was sent to Central Prison, Bengaluru on Wednesday after a special court remanded him in judicial custody till November 25.
Enforcement Directorate sleuths, who’d arrested him in a money-laundering case, will grill his driver and some close aides in Kerala. Bineesh, 37, has been accused of financing over Rs 5.2 crore to his aide Mohammed Anoop, 38, who was arrested by the Narcotics Control Bureau on August 22. Anoop and his accomplice Rijesh Ravindran, 37, who is also Bineesh’s associate, were booked under the NDPS Act and are lodged in Central Prison.
Bineesh was produced before the special court on Wednesday after his 14-day custodial interrogation ended. His lawyers applied for bail, but ED’s Bengaluru unit opposed it. ED’s special public prosecutor said Bineesh is politically influential and could tamper with evidence and influence witnesses in the case. ED also cited pending probe and the possibility of him fleeing the country.
ED said Bineesh’s driver Ani Kuttan made cash deposits from the former’s bank account into that of Anoop. Bineesh, however, claimed he had given Rs 7 lakh. His aide Arun S was involved in highvalue transactions which need to be probed, the directorate said. Sleuths are in the process of forensically examining digital evidence gathered from gadgets found in Bineesh’s Thiruvananthapuram house and from Anoop’s devices seized by NCB.