‘Shrunken underwear’: HC quashes case from 1990 against Kerala minister

The Kerala High Court (HC) on Friday, March 10, quashed the case of alleged evidence tampering against state Transport Minister Antony Raju, over a piece of dark blue underwear that was furnished as evidence in a case related to drug smuggling over 30 years ago. The case dates back to the year 1990 when Raju was a junior lawyer representing an Australian citizen Andrew Salvatore Cervelli, who was accused of smuggling hashish by concealing it in his underwear. 

The court gave the verdict on Friday on a plea moved by Raju to quash the case against him. However, the high court quashed the proceedings before the trial court only on technical grounds and left it open to the court or any competent authority to initiate action against Raju for falsifying evidence, according to Bar and Bench. “Though, this court interfered in the proceedings for technical reasons, it cannot be ignored that the allegations raised are serious in nature. The materials placed before this court reveal allegations which are of such nature and gravity that interfere with the judicial functions and thereby polluting the mechanism of administration of justice,” said the court, according to The Hindu.

Nearly 33 years ago, when Cervelli approached the high court in an appeal against his conviction by a trial court, the underwear in question was found to have mysteriously shrunk in size. His lawyers argued that the garment was too small to fit the accused, leading the high court to acquit Cervelli of all charges. However, a few years later, the investigating officer in the smuggling case approached the high court seeking a probe into alleged evidence tampering.

Later, an FIR was registered against Raju in 1994 on a complaint filed by an official of the Sessions Court, Thiruvananthapuram. The investigation found that Jose, a court clerk, in connivance with Antony Raju tampered with the material evidence. Both of them were charged with conspiracy, tampering with documents, cheating and destruction of evidence. 

After 12 years of investigation, in 2006, the Assistant Commissioner of Police filed a chargesheet before the Additional Chief Judicial Magistrate Court, Thiruvananthapuram, alleging offences under charges of criminal conspiracy, cheating and dishonestly inducing delivery of property and causing disappearance of evidence of offence.

In July last year, court documents related to the case became publicly available, and the chargesheet revealed that Raju had collected the belongings, including the said dark blue underwear, from the court and later returned it, after altering its size. The police later got information that the garment was collected from the courtroom by bribing a clerk in charge, it said. 

Raju's argument for quashing the case was that the crucial piece of "underwear evidence" was in the custody of the trial court while it was allegedly tampered with and, therefore, it should have been the court in question that initiated the proceedings to look into the case. But in this case, the proceedings were initiated on the complaint of the police.

His plea argued that the court took cognisance of the case upon a chargesheet by the police and the police have no authority to conduct an investigation in such cases. It said that the police cannot file a chargesheet in the case before the court and the proceedings pending before the court is 'non-est' (one that can be ignored altogether) in the eye of the law.

Expressing happiness over Friday’s verdict, Raju said he has been targeted politically by the then Chief Minister Oommen Chandy and a state Minister. "I knew I had done no wrong and now I am cleared. At this time I forgive those who worked against me," said Raju.