By IANS,
Kochi : The case of alleged corruption by Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPI-M) Kerala secretary Pinarayi Vijayan will be heard by the high court here Wednesday. The case has taken Kerala by storm and has created ripples in national politics.
On Monday, a division bench of the Kerala High Court ordered that on Wednesday it will hear Vijayan’s response to a notice served to him last week regarding his alleged involvement in the graft case.
An NGO had filed a petition with the court, stating that the governor’s sanction was not required to prosecute Vijayan, who has been accused in a multi-million rupee corruption scam by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) after awarding contracts to renovate two hydro-power projects to Canadian company SNC Lavalin 12 years ago when he was power minister.
The NGO filed the petition since there have been cases in the past when ministers were prosecuted only after sanction was obtained from the governor.
The division bench had last week asked advocate general C.P. Sudhakar Prasad for his views and also asked Vijayan to file his response to the NGO’s petition.
Veteran advocate M.K. Damodaran appeared in court for Vijayan Monday. The bench headed by Acting Chief Justice J.B. Koshy decided to postpone the hearing to Wednesday as others have now come forward to join the petition.