CBI to probe Manoj murder, says Chennithala

Thiruvananthapuram: The Central Bureau of Investigation will be probing the murder of RSS worker, K Manoj, said Home Minister Ramesh Chennithala in a statement.

The Minister said that the government accepted the DGP's recommendation to entrust the case to the CBI.

Addressing the media persons, Chennithala said that the accused have connections outside the state and abroad due to which the government decided to hand over the investigation to the CBI.

Earlier, the Crime Branch had issued a lookout notice for the main accused in the murder of K Manoj, an RSS leader in Thalassery.

Any information about V Vikraman (42) should be passed on to the Crime Branch SP at 9497996944, Kannur SP at 9497996973 or Crime Branch DySP at 9497990215. The accused is a confidant of a top CPI(M) leader in Kannur. According to eyewitnesses, he had led a team to kill Manoj.

Manoj was murdered on September 1 and Vikraman was spotted in and around Thalassery during that time, the police said. Even though the police had started a search immediately after the murder, it is believed that he went into hiding with support from influential people.

The Crime Branch conducted search operations in the house of Vikraman and Jithin, the two accused who have been identified so far.

Meanwhile, CPI(M) leader, P Jayarajan, whose son had made a provocative Facebook post soon after the murder, said that the comments by his son were inappropriate. He added that it was natural that the police had filed a case against Jainraj following the controversy that arose because of the post.

The CPI(M) leader also said that there was nothing wrong in Opposition Leader V S Achuthanandan saying that the action of the police was natural. He also added that legal experts had advised him that the case filed by the police would not stand the test of law.

In a related development, the CPI(M) has criticised the government for imposing provisions of the UAPA on the accused in the Manoj murder case. Alleging that the provisions of the UAPA were imposed because of the political conspiracy between the Congress and the BJP, CPI(M) district secretary P Jayarajan wondered why the provisions of a terrorist act should be invoked in a case in which one person was killed and another injured. He added that UAPA was originally meant to be imposed on those who tried to break the integrity and sovereignty of the nation. He said that in North India, the provisions of the law had often been used to brand people as terrorists.

Jayarajan said that it was mysterious that UAPA provisions were filed in the FIR itself and added that the nexus between the Congress and the BJP was evident on September 3 when an all-party peace meet was convened by the collector. The BJP was assured of a CBI probe as soon as leaders went to meet the CM, Jayarajan said.

Jayarajan said that according to the CM, the accused had been charged under section 15 of the UAPA law, which deals with terror attacks using explosives such as dynamites. He said that in the past one month, four people were killed by the RSS and not even one of those murders was booked under the UAPA provisions. He alleged that the law was implemented to target minorities and that the CPI(M) had opposed it when it was implemented.

Citing the recent statement by Congress leader K Sudhakaran that the conspiracy behind the murder was hatched in a bar in Mahe, Jayarajan said that the Congress leader need to be charged with the same provisions of section 118 that was charged against him following the Shukkoor murder case. Section 118 is filed when people do nothing to prevent a crime in spite of coming to know about it before the crime is committed.