Judge declines to hear case against VS

KOCHI: Justice P S Gopinathan of the Kerala High Court on Monday recused from hearing a petition seeking a directive to quash the FIR in the case related to the allotment of land to T K Soman, an ex-serviceman and a nephew of Opposition Leader V S Achuthanandan. The judge had declined to stay further proceedings in the case when it came up for hearing last week. He had also directed the state government to file a statement in response to the petition within ten days.However, when the case came up for hearing on Monday, the judge asked the registry to post it to another bench. The petition was filed by A Suresh, the eighth accused in the case and the private secretary to the Opposition Leader V S Achuthanandan. He  asked the court to quash the FIR registered against the Opposition Leader and others. The prosecution case was that Achuthanandan had illegally allotted 2.33 acres of government land in Kasargod district to his relative Soman, when he was the Chief Minister.  Suresh contended that he was wrongly arraigned as an accused in the case. He said the case registered against him by the Vigilance was politically motivated. There were no evidence to make out a case against the accused. The allegation against him is that he had instigated the officials to allot the land in favour  of Achuthanandan’s relative. Besides Achuthanandan, the other accused in the case are former Revenue Minister K P Rajendran, the then Land Revenue Commissioner K R Muraleedharan, the then Principal Secretary Sheela Thomas,  Achuthanandan’s relative Soman and former Kasargod Collectors Anand Singh and Krishnan Kutty.